Parents, Watch This Before Halloween!

should Christians involve themselves in Halloween it's a good question isn't it I'm sure just about any local church out there that stands on the authority of the Bible would say we've got to avoid the Pagan practices need to avoid that stuff I've had some people say maybe we can just avoid Halloween altogether you know it's tough to do you know I've got some kids and we can't even go to a grocery shop without seeing a whole aisle on Halloween it's tough to avoid it isn't it in fact at a local grocery store they pass out

stickers to my kids that have a witch on it There They are promoting paganism right there to your kids today we're going to talk about Halloween paganism and the Bible and that's quite an interesting topic particularly for Christians uh you know we're right around this Halloween season and so a lot of people ask this question they say well what's going on with Halloween you know how should Christians view this and so that's why I put this talk together we wanted to look at Halloween take a look at it from a Biblical viewpoint try to get

a better understanding of it and see what's going on with that particular Festival now you'll notice in the title paganism there's a big connection between Halloween and paganism and so there's a significant portion of this talk we'll end up talking about paganism and those sorts of aspects we're going to do it from a hopefully God honoring a perspective taking a look at this uh this ancient religion well I also noticed we have some kids out in the audience now this talk is primarily geared toward the adults it's geared toward your upper High School levels probably

as well although if there are kids in here it shouldn't be that big of a deal I just want to tell you right up front we are going to be talking about some of this paganism some of the sacrifice and some of the stuff that they've been doing but they should be able to sit through this without a big issue the last I want to tell you right up the front is I'm going to do some a little bit of a connection between paganism and evolution and how those relate a lot of people don't realize

the connections between an evolutionary worldview and paganism in our culture but you'll probably look at my first slide as I pop it up here Halloween paganism in the Bible and you notice everything's orange have you guys ever thought about that why is orange the color of Halloween I actually looked this up and did a little research on it believe it or not the ultimate reason is because of a pumpkin you know when it comes to modern day Halloween who is it that loves it you know who loves Halloween the stores the stores love it don't

they do you realize when it comes to uh Halloween and what all is going around on the Halloween season it numbers up to about 11 billion dollars in sales this was just for last year it wouldn't surprise me if the numbers exceed that this year perhaps even in some subsequent years but what that comes out to this is just in the United States mind you so that comes up to about 125 dollars per household on things like costumes trick-or-treating candy decorations many of these things are quite questionable actually from a Christian viewpoint but stores absolutely

love it you know who hates it insurance companies insurance companies do not like a lot of things happen on Halloween it really does you know if you think of arson there's a number of uh acts of arson that happen and occur on Halloween particularly in Detroit that's one of the areas that's well known for it there's other aspects and other dangers to Halloween for example pins poison and things like that that appear in candy you know I grew up in western part of Illinois kind of out in the middle of nowhere myself and some friends

we all went trick-or-treating when I was a kid you know we used to think it was just some innocent fun we never thought much about I hadn't been taught much about that and uh one year uh we got some candy my dad was looking through it I never understood why my dad would look through but he looked there and he found a pen in one of my pieces of candy so he called up the the friends that I went with and their parents looked through their candy and lo and behold there was pens in there

as well so it really does happen it actually occurred in a little bitty place in the middle of nowhere that you wouldn't think something like that would occur what about theft when I first moved out here to Northern Kentucky I bought a house and the very first Halloween I was gone for a couple hours and somebody broke into my house they did everything they could to pry open the windows they couldn't get that window open that was a good window so finally they just broke the door in and went in and stole a bunch of

things one of the things they stole was a bunch of Christian CDs which was interesting hopefully they listened to him and read the lyrics and got saved but uh you never know but see that stuff does happen we also see spikes in a cult activity and crime spikes Boston has released some of their statistics for their crime spikes and you can kind of see it on this chart if you look on the left side there's a big spike right there at October 31st and what that is that's about a 50 crime Spike this is over

a three year period of looking at those statistics so it really does jump up and I'd be curious to know what some other cities and places uh have for their crime spikes as well of course you just can't look at every single one of them but to get you thinking the subject Halloween and the Bible I want to pull up this cartoon take a look at this what is biblically wrong with this picture now I've had people go ah oh well these are all elements of of Halloween this is paganism we got to watch out

for this but think biblically all those things were created by God weren't they yeah they were you see they're they're things that God created the problem with this is the order okay the pumpkin should be first because plants were made on day three the Moon is second that was made on day four the flying creatures which include bats that would have been made on day five and then this cat is a land animal that was made on day six so it's the order of creation we sometimes look at this and we're conditioned to think the

way the world is where we say ah this is Pagan stuff we got to watch out for this stuff no these are things created by God and what's happened is they've been hijacked or taken over uh in a pagan worldview so we just have to watch out for that in fact when it comes to Halloween there's a lot of things that have Pagan Roots consider for example jack-o'-lanterns there's some history of that to go back to uh Pagan accounts trick-or-treating uh costume masks ghost stories bobbing for apples black cats for example you know crossing your

path things like that these are things that a lot of times are seen with Pagan Roots now I know I've thrown that term out Pagan quite often now and you're probably wondering what exactly is paganism well let me give you the definition of paganism a polytheistic or pantheistic nature worshiping religion well that didn't help much did it uh actually let me explain this a little bit more poly means many theistic means god polytheistic Mindy God multiple God systems so anytime you see something like Greek mythology or Norse mythology or Germanic mythology Egyptian mythology things like

that where it has many gods in it that would be a forms of paganism pantheistic here pan means uh all all is one here essentially pantheistic basically the universe is God or all of nature is God you almost worship the universe or the universe is all that there is that type of a nature worshiping religion now thinking of this definition all sorts of things are actually lumped under paganism it's kind of like an overarching term for a multitude of religions obviously it includes your mythological religions it includes Wicca and Witchcraft things like that it also

includes the occult it can include Eastern religions I know when I say that a lot of people think Hinduism uh Hinduism in one sense is kind of pagan but in one sense it's also not classed as pagan as well the way I would typically term Hinduism has many elements of paganism but isn't necessarily a typical form of paganism I know some people have called it Indian paganism to try to distinguish it but I think the easy way to think about it is it's got many elements of paganism anything that has ancestor worship you might think

of Finn Shinto of Japan or some of the other uh ancestor worship type religions The Druids things like that nature worship anytime people basically worship the universe worship the creation instead of the creator that is a form of paganism that's warned against in Romans chapter one but I want you to understand that actually includes things like Evolution and Atheism which simply look at the world in the universe as simply being all that there is there's a man named Carl Sagan he was famous for an old TV series called Cosmos now that series was more recently

redone with the Neil deGrasse Tyson but uh Carl Sagan look at one of the things he says here he's an atheist and an evolution look what he says here the cosmos is all that is ever was or ever will be this was kind of his opening to his cosmo series going back all the way to 1980. do you realize that's a pagan statement that's what that is there is a connection between paganism and an evolutionary worldview The evolutionary worldview was actually developed by pagans it was first promoted and developed by the epicureans Paul argued against

the epicureans in Acts chapter 17 that's one of the forms of Greek mythology they were essentially The Atheist and evolution business of their day and even nowadays you'll see a number of pagans who actually refer to Evolution a lot of times they'll actually go hand in hand with each other well when did modern day Halloween get started in the United States what actually goes back to an ancient group of people called the Celts and many of you might be familiar with the Celtics the Boston Celtics and basketball team they're actually named for the Celts that's

kind of where their name comes from but the Celts are an ancient people group typically they were in the Northwestern part of Europe included places like Ireland and the British Isles that's where I ended up dominating now they had a very popular Empire at one stage it spanned over much of Europe at one stage but a lot of the Irish and some of the Scots when they were migrating to the United States in the mid-18 to early 1900s actually brought Halloween with them over because they were still celebrating that and now it started to catapult

to you know get up to the 1930s 1950s you start to see Halloween start to explode and the United States up to Modern Times well who were these Celts how does this relate to the Bible if you actually go back in the Bible we go back to the events at the Tower of Babel and even before that you have Noah After the flood and we can actually track a lot of Noah's descendants and one of Noah's grandsons Gomer that's where places like France Gaul or Galia uh gelt celt these are actually variant names and forms

of Gomer and his descendants you'll also recognize some names up here galatia on the map some of the Galatians fought and ended up down in turkey and they were left there Paul wrote a letter to the Galatians uh there in the New Testament just to give you an idea so a lot of the Celts dominated in this particular region of Europe and many of them were descendants of government now you might think well it's that simple they're descendants of Gomer it's actually more complicated than this because you have other people groups in the area too

one of Gomer's sons was ashkenaz and this is basically where the Germanic peoples came from not just Germany and Austria and you know places like that some of the Norse lands but also the Angles and the Saxons who migrated over to England and they ended up over in there that's actually where the name England comes from it comes from the angles which is one of the German tribes well there's others as well Magog for example they're three ancient lineages of Magog that showed dissent of the people of Ireland there was a lot of mixing between

the Irish and the Scots as well and another one of Noah's grandsons was tubal who is where Spain was and a lot of them ended up migrating as far up as the British Isles as well as into Galia or Gaul or some of those Celtic lands so he got a lot more going on in here than as simple as what I just initially put up there these ancient Celts they had a festival and it was actually run by The Druids The Druids had this festival called salwin or seiween is kind of how it was pronounced

it looks like Sam Hain but that's actually not how it's pronounced but this Festival goes back about 2 000 years ago this is really where the roots of modern day Halloween go to it was basically a Day of the Dead they offered sacrifices of animals plants and many times of people as well sometimes they're enemies sometimes it was just some of their own innocence and many times this was to honor the dead well I know I threw the name Druid out there probably wondering who are the Drew words The Druids were essentially like the religious

leaders or the scholars the Priestly class of the Celts here who had emerged as the elite essentially throughout Britain and Ireland they had deviated to a path of paganism very similar to that of Hinduism for example they were polytheistic in their worldview they had many gods that is they believed in a form of reincarnation basically if you died you would come back in the form of someone else or as part of someone else or as part of the creation in general and they had a form of ancestry worship here well The Druids is a little

bit more about them they tended to meet in groves caves and the remote valleys that they held sacred they took over places like Stonehenge and wood hens and Castle rig Stone Circle in fact there's a number of these over there in that particular area but that's not the only place these are actually ancient structures and The Druids later on took them over The Druids Rose in prominence about 700 BC even though the Celts go all the way back to the Tower of Babel just to kind of give you that little bit of a connection but

many of these places were built before that and The Druids simply took them over do you realize we actually find some Stone circles like Stonehenge and wood hinge over here in the Americas if you go up to uh Beaver Island for example in Michigan they have a couple of stone hinges there kind of smaller in scope one of them is actually submerged at this stage we have some wood hinges one of them right up here just north of Cincinnati some of the Native American tribes had actually built some of these there's uh a couple of

them at Cahokia Illinois where the Mississippian culture really their their head up places right across from St Louis was that they have a couple wood hinges there but essentially The Druids kind of be Rose in prominence after that took over many of these places now what I found was interesting here was they claimed that as The Druids here they claimed dissent according to the Romans of the Roman god Dees Potter now you're probably like what in the world did I just say right there Potter means father a lot of the these people who had ancestor

worship believed them to be gods they were just their ancestors back in the past that they had elevated to a god-like status it's not to be confused with the one true God of the Bible but deese was the name of that person well the Greek equivalent of that particular so-called God was Pluto it's actually where the planet's name Pluto came from oh wait it's not a planet anymore back in my day it was a planet but that's where that name comes from but that's actually a variant name of one of Noah's grandson's tubal that we

mentioned so it does kind of make sense that this would be one of the people that they would look to for their ancestry well where did the name Halloween come from I know we just meant mental uh salwin of the name Halloween come from because what that just doesn't even connect does it well that actually goes back to a little bit of history with the church in particular in the ad600s the church actually had a festival called All Saints Day which was to honor the Martyr dead of the church on May 13th now what they

ended up doing was because they had this Day of the Dead that just kept persisting which occurred on November 1st they decided hey let's move All Saints Day to November 1st okay so they moved it then to kind of be a Christian alternative to that Pagan Day of the Dead fact is the All Saints Day became very popular and it just started to span all throughout Europe it became a huge Festival they have ancient paintings an example uh shown here of some of these festivals well a little bit more to that the evening before All

Saints Day became known as All Hallows Eve or All Hallows even or it was simply reduced to Halloween and that was on October 31st see a lot of people don't realize at sunset October 31st that's when the saloon Festival began and it ended at the end of the day on November 1st basically it's Sunset around then we don't think of the uh the days beginning and ending like that but that's the way they kind of looked at that so basically the day before became a big Festival as well so it almost became a two-day Festival

well because the Day of the Dead that Celtic sowin Festival continued to persist finally what the church did was well you know what let's just have All Souls day on November 2nd and they almost mixed the holidays if you want to call them holidays like that together on November 2nd and that way they had a three-day event and coming down to today Halloween's the one that dominates out of all that well don't other cultures have a Day of the Dead actually there's quite a few back in ancient times Rome had one a lot of people

don't uh put the connection together here but Rowan was right in here the Celts were right up here the Roman Empire ended up dominating much of the Celtic land now you would have thought okay the Romans have a Day of the Dead the Celts have a Day of the Dead did one overpower the other well not really what happened is they basically fueled each other that Roman Day of the Dead it was actually a three-part Festival one of them it began with parentalia and it ended with feralia if I'm saying that right I've anglicized it

here but they basically fueled each other the Day of the Dead just continued to persist as a result now when I say Day of the Dead many of you guys out in my audience today would probably recognize that over here in the United States our Southern neighbor Mexico has is very famous for their Day of the Dead Aren't They yeah they celebrate that quite often we have a lot of people from Mexico that have migrated up the United States and they brought the day of the day with them we're fairly familiar with that one well

that's just three do you realize days of the Dead appear all over the world the Aztec the Olmec the Iroquois Bolivia has one of the people in Brazil have one you go over to places like Asia China has one the Ghost Festival for example Japan has the bond or the Oban Festival here now there was a movie a number of years ago not that I'm advocating going out watching some of these movies because a lot of these movies have some pretty bad things in it but there was a movie series called Karate Kid and this

is the old one apparently there was a new one if you guys remember the old karate kid did something like that well in that movie they go over to Japan and while they're over there they're celebrating this huge festival and a lot of people don't realize what that Festival was that was their Day of the Dead that was their bond or the Oban Festival they they sometimes watch these things and they've not been able to discern uh what is going on there in the background of these things so you have to watch out for that

uh Vietnam has one Nepal Korea even the Hindi and India have won Philippines have one they're all over the place I'm just giving you a sample of some of these so when you think okay you have the the Celts who have their Day of the Dead the Romans have one Mexico has them they're all over the world is there a connection between them is there a connection between Halloween and the other days of the Dead I would suggest that there is if you start looking at the commonalities of the days of the Dead many times

it was to honor the Dead the ancestors the souls this is all across the world and many of these were at the end of summer to midfall how many of them actually matched up fairly well with the Celtic Day of the Dead there toward the end of October beginning in November uh oftentimes it was for remembrance of sins it was a time to have sacrifices and what I would suggest is you know what all these go back when the cultures were connected it goes all the way back to the events that occurred at the Tower

of Babel so what is the original source of Halloween in other days of the Dead do you realize Scholars have recognized this you go back when Halloween started to gain in prominence for example in the 1930s a scholar here he recognized this and he had a connection all the way back to the flood sacrifices remember Noah After the flood he offered sacrifices of all the clean animals that was essentially a yearly sacrifice LED all the way up to Babel and then from Babel people split to different parts of the world you know other Scholars have

recognized this as well Dr Alfred Ray Winkle he's a professor of theology at Concordia this is back in the 1950s he recognized these guys all have a day dead and he directly related this to the flood of Noah's day so is the event of Noah's sacrifice for the Day of the Dead really originates well it's possible it was a time when there was sacrifice to cover sins and a reminder of why death Reigns in the Sin cursed world it was a spiritual time a time when people remembered that a disaster the global flood took virtually

the entire population as a punishment for sin Halloween's Roots could easily extend this far now here's what's interesting the sacrifices of Noah were not the first sacrifices in the Bible sacrifice actually went back before Noah so let's take a look at this what is the relationship between sacrifice and the word of God you know the god of the Bible is a perfect God isn't he he's a perfect God a perfect God made a perfect creation that's what we expected from a perfect God Deuteronomy 32 4 says he's a rock speaking of God here his work

is perfect we expected the work of creation to be perfect that's what we expected at the end of the creation week God saw everything that he had made and indeed it was very good it really was it was very good it was perfect that's what we expected imagine a perfect world for a second a world with no death no Bloodshed no suffering kids no homework yeah man no baldness yeah perfect world wasn't it everything was perfect but you see everything change because we're not in a perfect world anymore and that brings us to sin remember

that serpent influenced by Satan deceived the woman to eat from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil now if if Adam and Eve had eaten from the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil there was a problem wasn't there Genesis 2 17 says but of the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil you shall not eat from the day that you eat of it you shall surely die you see the punishment for sin is death Adam and Eve realized they were naked they were ashamed they immediately went and

took some fig leaves and sewed fig leaves Together made coverings from themselves that was crazy have you ever felt a fig leaf that makes the worst possible clothing do you see those fig Leaf clothings weren't good enough the punishment for sin was death so the solution had to involve death Look What the Lord did in Genesis 3 21. also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin and clothe them you see this is the first recorded death of anything in scripture the Lord essentially sacrificed animals to cover that sin you know

we oftentimes picture that as a lamb in our children's books and at the Creation Museum and we do that as a foreshadow of Jesus Christ who's called the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world but notice this was a blood sacrifice essentially in fact because of sin everything changed in the world that's why we see death and suffering and all those horrible atrocities we see all sorts of terrible things we see natural disasters we see tyrants destroy and kill their people it's just terrible but you know we're in a culture that

sees those things they see what people like Hitler and Stalin have done in the past they've seen other types of horrible atrocities and they cry and they say God why'd you make the world like this or they see a a tsunami and an earthquake that goes in and wipes out tons of people along coastlines they say God why'd you do this why did you make the world like this they see the Twin Towers or and you name the atrocity and they crown they say God why they see a world that's full of joy and sorrow

they see a world that's full of life and death they see a world of love and hate and they say God why'd you make the world like this and you see what it is is they don't have a proper understanding of the Bible if you go back to the early pages of the Bible God made everything perfect it's because of man's sin that the world is like this see it's essentially our fault because of man's sin that's why death is in the world it is a punishment for sin you know Adam lived 930 years and

according to the Bible he died his son Seth he died all through Genesis chapter 5 people died well with the exception of Enoch Enoch was taken straight to heaven without death you know that always makes an interesting trivia question doesn't it who is the longest lived person in the Bible that died that's recorded in the Bible and yet his father outlived him and that is Methuselah he lived 969 years and yet his father never die quite interesting very last verse of the Book of Genesis so Joseph died see the punishment for sin was death and

death reigned as a result of sin well let's go back there to those early pages Adam and Eve sin to get kicked out of the Garden of Eden they have Cain Abel they have Seth they have other sons and daughters in Genesis 5 4. so originally brothers and sisters had to marry I've got two beautiful sisters but friends that's not happening it was a time of Moses in Leviticus chapter 18 that's when God said No More close in her marriage Abraham married his half-sister Sarah for example Moses's father actually married his aunt jochebed but it

was after the time of Moses God said no more of that but see notice with Abel Abel offered fat portions and that was an acceptable sacrifice he mimicked what the Lord did Cain offered his first roots not that first fruits are bad but that wasn't the sacrifice required you needed that blood sacrifice so the Lord respected Abel's sacrifice Noah offered sacrifices in Genesis 8 20. this is After the flood he offered of each of the uh clean animals there he wasn't the only one all the way from that point all the way up through Babel

as it spread about people were offering sacrifices we still see people around the world who are still offering sacrifices even today but look at the Bible Abraham offered sacrifices the Israelites offered sacrifices and that is all pointing to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who is the ultimate sacrifice do you realize Christians we don't sacrifice today because Christ's sacrifice was sufficient let's look at some big picture theology the punishment from an infinite God is an infinite punishment are animals infinite no the best they could do was cover that sin they couldn't really satisfy God's wrath

upon that sin what we needed was a perfect infinite sacrifice that could take the infinite punishment from the infinite father Jesus Christ the son of God who is infinite he could take that punishment only he was in a position to do that so the infinite son stepped into history to become a man and he took the infinite punishment from the infinite father and that was enough to satisfy God's wrath upon sin for as an Adam all die even so in Christ shall all be made alive First Corinthians 15 22. and so it is written the

first man Adam became a living being the last Adam that's Jesus Christ here became a life-giving spirit you see Hebrews 9 26 says he then would have to suffer often since the foundation of the world but now once at the end of the ages Jesus has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself he was that ultimate sacrifice he did it once for all he doesn't have to do it over and over again his sacrifice was sufficient second Corinthians 5 21 for he may he made him who knew no sin to be sin

for us so that we might become the righteousness of God do you realize that Christ by right should never been able to die on the cross you know why the punishment for sin is death was Christ a sinner no by rights he shouldn't have been able to die on that cross he should have just been able to suffer you know why he was able to die on that cross because he bore our sin our sin was taken on Christ on that cross oh how precious is his blood first John 1 7. you see the blood

of Jesus Christ his son cleanses us from all sin you see that's more of a proper understanding of sacrifice of sin and the relationship between sin and death and what Christ did to save us on that cross now let's step back and get a get a better perspective of the world let's get a Biblical perspective of the world you see God made the world perfect it's because of man's sin that the world is in the situation that it's in that's why death and disease and struggling and suffering extinctions exist in our world today but Christ

steps into history to save us from sin and death and there'll be a new heavens and a new Earth where there will be no more death no more suffering that's something to look forward to let me liken it like this let's say you're looking at a statue like one of those ancient Greek or Roman statues for example people sometimes it looks broken to me you see same thing with the world oh it looks wonderful looks marvelous and it's firing it's so beautiful that don't get me wrong there is a remnant of beauty out there we

still see that but overall it's broken we need to step back and say what are you talking about what are you looking at it looks broken to me you see if we go all the way back to the early pages of the Bible Genesis chapter 3 the ground is cursed because of man's sin Romans chapter 8 confirms this for we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth tanks together until now you see that's why we need a new heavens and a new Earth that's why we need the curse to be removed and

the last two chapters of Revelation actually talk about the new heavens and the new Earth the curse being removed there'll be no more death that is something exciting to look forward to well let's get a Biblical timeline of these events I know I've been throwing different things out here The Druids the Celts and everything that's going on here let's just look at this biblically if we start creation we go back here early pages of the Bible here in the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth most chronologists actually arrive at that about 4000 BC

I've actually tallied up numbers very similar to usher and I'll talk about that here in just a moment but uh not long after the creation that's when Adam and Eve sin against God very soon after it was before Adam and Eve conceived their first child Cain so a lot of people put that right away that's when sacrifice was first instituted and then we have sacrifices with Noah After the flood the flood sacrifice is here I'm just following Usher's chronologies at least fairly similar here then we have those sacrifices leading all the way up to the

tower BaByliss people go to different parts of the world they take that sacrifice with them it starts to get corrupted over the years as people paganize it and destroy it and change its meaning and then you start to see the the Celts dominate much of uh Europe here in 700 BC just to give you a time reference I put Abraham in here about 2000 BC but the Celts begin to dominate and out of the couch you see The Druids start to raises the elite around this particular time I put Christ in here as a Time

referent just to give you an idea and then the church's response with the All Saints Day With All Hallows even and then you see All Souls day for example in here as well and that brings us to the Irish Celts for example is one of those groups bringing Halloween to the United States beginning in the 1840s leading up to today well how should Christians respond to Halloween's paganism first things first I think we need to be Discerning shouldn't we we need to start training ourselves in this issue training our children training our churches and apologetics

not just around Halloween which I encourage but also around Creation in general being able to defend the authority of the Bible in today's day and age is of utmost importance otherwise we could get blown to every wind of doctrine that the world keeps throwing at us Matthew 28 19-20 this is the Great Commission Jesus says go therefore Make Disciples of all Nations baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son of the Holy Spirit teaching them to observe all things that I've commanded you and lo I Am With You Always even to

the End of the Age amen you see we're supposed to go out and make disciples we're supposed to teach them to observe all things that Christ has commanded hey do you realize Christ is God and the word of God is right here this is what Christ commanded you see we're supposed to be teaching people to observe all of this to understand it to make disciples you know that's almost a lost art in many churches across this country isn't it you know that would be significance I suggest we need to start doing that because you know

what when you don't have the word of God grounded you struggle you know the Bible warns in second Corinthians 11 3 but I fear less somehow as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness so your minds may be corrupted from the Simplicity that is in Christ you see if we don't get discipled if we're not taught all that crisis commanded we may be led astray by false ideas particular false ideas of our day you see in our day there's a battle there's a battle over two religions how would you understand there's only two religions in

the world that's it just two gods and not gods you understand that too that's it all the other world religions that are out there one way or another have to borrow from man's ideas you see man would be seen as the authority one way or another to be superseding God and his word you see in a broad sense that's a battle over Christianity versus humanism it has brought a sense that is see humanism is whenever man's ideas have been elevated to supersede God in his word and there's a lot of forms of it now in

our popular culture today our humanism that we tend to encounter all the time is an evolutionary atheistic type of a worldview things uh with big bang millions of years in Evolution for example you see these are subsets to the religion of say secular humanism in the same way that creation the fall in the flood are subsets to the religion of Christianity you see it's a battle over two different religions now I've had people say now hold on a second Bodhi isn't it isn't it science versus the Bible no you know I've got a master's degree

in mechanical engineering I developed a new method of production a submicron titanium diboride that was English by the way but you know what I can tell you about science is science is observable and repeatable has anyone ever observed or repeated the Big Bang no has anyone ever observed a repeated millions of years no has anyone ever observed or repeated the changing of a single-celled organism like an amoeba into a cow never seen it you see that's not science you know what that is that is a religion that is being imposed upon people as though it

were good operational observable science and we're not seeing that now there's a lot of forms of humanism floating around in our culture there's secular humanism or secularism atheism which says there's no God there's new atheism very aggressive form of atheism they're trying to impose atheism upon uh generations of people you have agnosticism which says we can't know if God exists in fact an agnosticism you can't know anything it's quite an interesting religion out there when people say they're not religious that's fancy way of saying you're humanist because you've already elevated your own thoughts to be

greater than God in his word it's form of paganism essentially naturalism or even paganism itself and all the forms that fit under it but I would go so far as to say any worldview that deviates from God in his word one way or another have humanistic elements in them but notice paganism here and see in our culture today this evolutionary paganism is rampant and what breaks my heart is many Christians say hey we can take some of these things maybe the Big Bang maybe maybe some Evolution maybe some Millions years maybe we can take some

of that and we can just mix it with our Christianity what happens if you mix two different religions like that do they mix no they don't usually something has to give and usually Christians start giving up the Bible Well maybe a day doesn't mean a day maybe those evenings and mornings aren't evenings and mornings maybe the sun was made on day one instead of day four just start rearranging it they start messing with it all because they're trying to take modern Pagan ideas and mix it with the Bible you know was the Lord happy with

the Israelites when they took the Baal worship which is paganism in their day and age was the Lord happy with them when they took that star to mix it no he wasn't orb was not happy at all well how should Christians respond to some of this evolutionary paganism well first things first we need to be Discerning let's keep that in mind on these issues we always need to be Discerning you know the Bible warns about deception Jesus said it take heed that you be not deceived do not be deceived do not be deceived says Paul

James says do not be deceived do you realize Christians can be deceived we can all be deceived you know I've looked at my own past there's times I've been deceived on great many things and it took me getting back to the word of God to get correct thinking on things I took God to do that but see notice in our culture we're in a culture today that teaches things sometimes in a very subtle way notice the progression here trick um you see we're in a culture that teaches millions and billions of years in an evolutionary

worldview as though it's a fact as though it's the truth and people celebrate it as though it's some wonderful truth and many times Christians are influenced by this type of stuff should we be influenced by that we need to step back and take a look you know Christians can be deceived by these things for example let me just do one example if I were to go to many Christian audiences around this country and I mentioned the Tree of Life do you think they would automatically think of the tree of life that's mentioned in the Garden

of Eden right next to the tree of the knowledge of good evil you think they think of that some of them probably would but you know what most of them would probably end up thinking of if I say Tree of Life they probably think of Darwin's Tree of Life because do you realize 90 of Christian kids for example actually attend State schools where they're taught Darwin's Tree of Life year after year after year that's most likely what they're going to look at this is Darwin's Tree of Life everything goes back to a single-celled organism essentially

and of course there's more modern forms of it and see a lot of times people don't recognize this isn't even a tree of life you know what it is it's a tree of death you see I want you to understand in an evolutionary paganistic worldview like that death is essentially the hero of the plot you have to have death to get things out of the way so that the next phase of evolution can occur you see death is almost like the ultimate aspect right there next to time you know it's interesting Proverbs 8 36 says

but he who sins against me wrongs his own soul all those who hate me love death you see in an evolutionary worldview death is that hero Carl Sagan also said the secrets of evolution are time and death you see time plus death is what ultimately leads up to man's existence in an evolutionary worldview you see you have to have that millions of years of death pain struggling suffering leading up to man's existence you just have to have it there in an evolutionary worldview I mean if you don't have millions of years let's say you have

uh five thousand years of Earth history would anybody possibly propose an evolutionary worldview no they have to have millions and billions of years in there well where does that idea millions and billions of years come from it actually comes from fossil layers you see in the evolutionary worldview what they do is they look at fossil layers they look at these Rock layers and they say ah let's assume there were no catastrophes in the past did you catch that that's a crazy assumption isn't it but that's the Assumption they operate on that there are no catastrophes

in the past and each one of these Little Rock layers were laid down slowly and gradually over long ages millions and billions of years long and you look in those Rock layers you see death pain struggling suffering Extinction Thorns things like that and they say ah all this millions of years leads up to man's existence well don't some Christians believe in millions of years too sadly yeah but you know what they're doing they're taking the world's ideas about that and they're mixing it with the Bible they're assuming there was no catastrophes in the past like

a global flood do you realize that and you know what when Christians buy into things like millions of years they run into a problem particularly on the issue of death consider for a moment if you have millions and billions of years of death pain struggling suffering before Adam sinned then death pain struggling suffering and extinctions and thorns and things like that are all a very good thing aren't they what really was the punishment for sin you see run into a problem especially when somebody loses a loved one or something happens they say oh God you're

the one who made the world like this it's all your fault instead of it being man's sin do you realize this affects a lot of people when churches do this sort of thing let's just use a couple of examples of people who've walked away from any form of faith in God in his word Ted Turner he had a little bit of a background in the church he understood who God was understood a little bit about the Bible but look at this Turner is a strident non-believer having lost his faith after his sister Mary Jane died

of a painful disease look what he says here I was taught that God was love and God was powerful I couldn't understand how someone so innocent should be made or allowed to suffer what he didn't understand was it's because the sin that the world is like this he should have hated sin instead he blame God for it he understood death is a bad thing he wanted to blame God for it here's another one Charles Darwin you know his wife attended a Unitarian cult that they had bought into millions of years millions of years preceded Darwin

by a little bit but look at this Annie's cruel death destroyed Charles tatters of belief in a moral just Universe later he would say that this period chimed the final death kneel for his Christianity Saint Charles look at the way they wrote this Saint Charles now took his stand as an unbeliever you see if you have millions and billions of years of death pain struggling and suffering and God did it that way you don't have an answer for why there's death and suffering fact is why would you need Jesus to save you from that kind

of stuff if that's the way that God made the world it's a big problem but see I want you to understand something that occurred with these gentlemen you know when looking at God they saw death as a bad thing but they wanted to blame God for that death instead of blaming sin but look at this look what they did they then walked away from any form of Godly worldview and they moved over to an evolutionary religion that then hailed death as the hero they saw death as a bad thing then they move over and they

start to worship it essentially you see what's happening and we see this within our culture we go out and we point out that God is good and God is loving and then there's that issue of death and suffering the problem of evil that just seems to Reign Over people it's like a vice that just comes in and starts squeezing that out but we're not to be conformed to the world we need to do is get back to the Bible what does the Bible say about this well if you go back to the Bible a perfect

God made a perfect creation it's because a man sin that death and sufferings in the world but take heart Jesus stepped into history to die on a cross for us sinners friends that is a loving God someone who would lay down his life for his friends you see when you have a proper biblical understanding of it it destroys that Vice you see we need to be transformed by the renewing of our mind so let's just look at that millions of years for just a brief moment those Rock layers that the world say took millions and

billions of years to get laid down you see many kids are pretty familiar with the geologic time together there's technical versions of this you know what creationists and Evolutions we all agree on this one aspect of this anyway the rock layers those are real Rock layers there really is ordovician rock layer Permian Rockler what we disagree is the timing in the secular world where they say it took 75 million years to lay down that or division or 50 million years to lay down that Permian Rock we do think in terms of a global flood we

do think in terms of a catastrophe in the past we're not limited like the world is global flood settlement boom laid down the majority of those Rock layers with fossils over the course of that year-long flood now we've had Rock layers since the time of the flood but the majority would have come from the flood of Noah's day you see that's where those Rock layers come from they're not evidence of millions and billions of years they're evidence of the flood of Noah's day but notice the millions of years virtually vanishes in light of a global

flood well how old is the earth then if you just look at the Bible how's the Earth well I think they gave us three hours in here so let's go ahead and start adding up those genealogy he just don't want to do that I'm telling you if you're ever having trouble sleeping don't count sheep don't take an Ambien Book of Numbers won't take long at all a short estimate here you know if you just flip to the tank command list let's start the Ten Commandments Exodus 20 verse 11. for six days the Lord made the

heavens the Earth the sea and all that is in them but he rested on the seventh day you see six days you know Moses and Israelites took this as six normal eight days you rest for a normal leg day so it's a normal creation week here the Earth was created on day one Adam was made on day six that's about five days in between there now if you add up those genealogies from Adam to Abraham and most people can do that that's in Genesis 5 and Genesis chapter 11 you get about 2 000 years you

can follow the genealogies that for example uh Genesis chapter five here it gives you all that chronological data you can just tally it right up with simple addition start with Adam you go all the way down here a couple up from the bottom is Abraham you move over it's about two thousand years after creation Now most Scholars Christian or secular completely agree that Abraham lived about 2 000 years before Christ which is four thousand years ago from today so from a rough estimate you get about six thousand years now uh some famous chronologists Arch Bishop

James Usher for example arrived at 4004 BC he did this in the 1600s and uh Sir Isaac Newton defended this date now Isaac Newton was arguably one of the greatest scientists who ever lived keep that in mind more recently Floyd Nolan Jones also arrived at 4004 BC in his book The chronology of the Old Testament now they don't agree on every point because there's a few places it's not straightforward to calculate but by and large are in general agreement and you know what there's been a host of chronologists who've been able to tally this up

over the last two thousand years going all the way back to church fathers I even have a handful of new ones that I've been able to find and this doesn't even including the Jewish counts but you'll notice there's quite a few here and they hover on each side of 4004 BC some a little more some a little bit less in fact I decided to tally this up recently I went from creation all the way up to when the Israelites come out of captivity and I didn't want to look at anybody else's stuff I just want

to do it in the Bible and I tallied it up and then I looked at some of the chronologists and I was actually four years off from Archbishop James Usher so I was kind of excited about that he had a couple places where a father and son were a co-regence and I didn't have that so he's probably right I'll have to go back and take a look but the point is you don't get millions and billions of years of death out of the Bible instead what you find is death it's the punishment for sin and

that's why we need a savior in Jesus Christ to save us from sin and death so what is the connection between paganism and evolution if you ever stop to think about that well remember Evolution can be a form of paganism by the way they both oppose God in his word they're both humanistic World Views they've got those overlaps there but notice this this is what I want to point out they both tend to love death they both do remember that evolutionary world view they tend to love death remember what Proverbs says here about that all

those who hate me love death the secrets of evolution their time and death that's that's the secret of evolution according to Carl Sagan according to many evolutionists you have to have that millions of years of death Bloodshed and suffering to lead up to man's existence I want you to understand death is the hero in an evolutionary worldview now compare this to the pagans taking cultures all over the world going back for thousands of years they very much love death they oftentimes sacrifice people to try to make their culture better they thought they would it would

make things better you know the Romans and the Greeks and people had actually commented on some of the sacrifice that The Druids and the pagans had done they would build these big cages that look like people they would put people in hay in them and some animals and they light it on fire they did all sorts of terrible things but look at some of the modern things going on in an evolutionary worldview with people like Hitler he was trying to wipe out people like the Jews the poles and the gypsies a number of others actually

as well Christians were even on his Target list he was trying to make a better Society by sacrificing people what about Margaret Sanger founder of Planned Parenthood the most merciful thing that a large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it you realize we're in a culture that just promotes this paganistic idea where death is still the hero in an evolutionary worldview in a pagan worldview death is the hero they overlap on this First Corinthians 10 20. this is Paul here Noah I imply that what Pagan's sacrifice they offered to Demons

and not to God I do not want you to be participants with demons we need to watch out for this kind of stuff and in this time this day and age where Halloween glorifies in Death Do you realize that's what it does they glorify in the death they glorify in the Pagan aspects of it we need to watch out for those types of things I've had people say well is paganism dangerous then yes it can be very dangerous in ancient times they oftentimes killed a lot of people it was quite dangerous but you know we

find that even in modern times there's a shooter in Oregon Mercer was his name he was a pagan the Oregon gunman who lined up his victims and asked specifically which ones were Christians before shooting them execution style had a special interest in Magic and spiritualism that's paganism that's what it is look what he says here under the category of religious views he wrote that he is not religious that's form of paganism that's form of humanism right there but look at this he is spiritual and was interested in Pagan and wicking well of course that's because

he's pagan his lifestyle was right after that now it's interesting Mercer who claimed he didn't believe in the god of the Bible he claimed he was not religious look what he said to his victims oh you're a Christian well you're about to see God you know this Pagan and his heart of hearts knew God existed he knew it that's what he was lashing out against he was trying to suppress the knowledge of God that's what Romans chapter 1 talks about people trying to suppress that see all those who hate me love death First Corinthians 15

26 Paul describes death as an enemy that needs to be destroyed you see death as an enemy in a Christian worldview we don't glorify in it we don't love death death is the enemy and Christ conquered that death on a cross Revelation 21 4 says there will be no more death in the new heavens and new earth that is something to be excited about but see that's a Christian Viewpoint not a pagan or an evolutionary viewpoint well how did we arrive in such a paganized culture well consider the the verse in judges here in those

days there was no king in Israel everyone did what was right in his own eyes what happens when people start to reject the king of kings they do whatever is right in their own eyes which could be anything and we're seeing that I mean consider what the Bible says about the mind of unbelievers Titus 1 15. to the pure all things are pure but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure but even their minds and consciences are defiled Romans 1 20-21 although they knew God they did not glorify him as God nor

were thankful but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish Hearts were darkened Romans 1 continues and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge God gave them over to a debased mind to do things which are not fitting they were backbiters haters of God violent proud boasters inventors of evil things disobedient to parents undiscerning untrustworthy unloving unforgiving and unmerciful the list goes on second Corinthians even says but even if our gospel is veiled it is veiled to those who are perishing whose Minds the God of this age has blinded when

the lord gave them over to a debase mine he basically gave him over to Satan the God of this world who blinds them II Timothy confirms this look at this only through God could they escape the snare of the devil they've been taken captive by him to do his will you know I put a lot of verses up there on that but I want you to understand the unbelieving Mind cannot think properly on these issues they have a debased mind so what do debase Minds do with the knowledge of God it's very simple they destroy

it they warp it they deviate from it they suppress it they turn from it I mean consider the mind of unbelievers if they can't think right about like true history they distort it or moral issues they destroy it uh sin and death they turn from it Christ and God they distort who he is I mean consider let's just look at history for a moment do you realize if you look back at ancient history from paganized cultures do you realize they have Creator Legends all the time A lot of times they replace the god of the

Bible with someone like Odin one of their ancestors that's found in King's list by the way paganized creation Legends paganized flood Legends we have over 300 flood Legends all over the world and they deviate from what the scripture says they've lost information they've embellished things paganized Tower Bible Legends we find those all over the world as well why would we not expect that sacrifice gets paganized and destroyed as people to take it to different parts of the world we expect them to destroy it sacrifices they take it to various parts Psalm 118 8 says it

is better to trust the Lord than to put confidence in man and yet what's so often is many of these people they've walked away from God the knowledge of God and so they stand on man's ideas and it gets destroyed you see in the Old Testament they had to deal with this they had to deal with paganism in the Old Testament do you realize that there's a number of places Leviticus here in the law where Moses is talking to him you know you got to watch over those who are practicing divination or Susan give no

regard to mediums or familiar spirits Deuteronomy 18. look at this watch out for those who are practicing witchcraft or a soothsayer one who interprets Omens or a sorcerer one who conjures spells or medium or a spiritus or one who calls upon the dead remember Saul King Saul went to a medium was the Lord happy with him not at all even our wise King Solomon nevertheless Pagan women even caused him to sin see we have to watch out for this they had to deal with this in the Old Testament do you realize they had to deal

with it in the New Testament as well Paul in Galatians chapter 5 here 19-21 talks about some of the works of the flesh here look at this you have to watch out for the idolatry and the sorcery these people they're not going to inherit the kingdom of God unless they repent receive Christ as Lord and Savior First Corinthians 12 2 you know that when you were pagans you were LED astray to mute idols you know what I like about this verse compared to a lot of these others because the show pagans can get saved I

love to see pagans repent and receive Jesus Christ but you see they were LED astrated mute idols but let's not forget modern paganization it's occurring right under our noses in evolutionary worldview is Pagan consider that it's a form of epicureanism that's just reared its ugly head in today's day and age but look at the paganization of other things let's just look at Christmas for example Santa Claus the paganization of Christmas Saint Nicholas was a great guy and yet Saint to Nicholas has been corrupted into Santa Claus and now Santa Claus apparently lives at the North

Pole he has omnipresent powers and he's The Keeper of the Naughty or Nice List they've taken attributes of God and they apply it to him that's paganism see the same thing with Frosty the Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer people are more about that and to see the Lord and Savior step into history what about the resurrection people are more about an Easter Bunny and eggs than they are about the Risen Savior what about the United States UK other parts of the western world our constitution actually says in the year of Our Lord in reference

to Jesus Christ and yet if a teacher in a state school says in the year of our lord they're liable to get fired for it because there's a separation of church and state it's an unconstitutional to say that and yet there it is in the Constitution you see the pagans have taken over this country that's what's happening that's what we're seeing breaks my heart we're seeing the paganization of the rainbow a rainbow is a promise from God that he will never again send a flood as he did in Noah's day to destroy all life you

see that's a natural rainbow you get to see out in the sky and yet people are lighting up these artificial rainbows and trying to change the meaning of the rainbow that's paganization paganization if you fell in the blanks all sorts of stuff let's just get back to the cross for a moment let's go back to the cross you know if a teacher were to put a cross up in their school they could probably be fired because the cross is seen as a symbol of Christianity isn't it but I want you to understand what the cross

was a symbol of the Cross was a symbol of death that's what it was the Romans if somebody crossed Rome they could die on a cross a very painful horrific slow death in front of everyone to see and they leave those crosses up so that people could see it it was a reminder you don't cross realm it was a symbol of death and yet Jesus Christ conquered death on a cross one of the most horrendous forms of death second Peter 2 24 who himself this is Christ here bore our sins in his own body on

that tree see essentially the cross is like a like a tree of life I can put it in quotes here by the blood of Jesus Christ it's only one way to be safe that's through Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit acts 4 12 nor is there salvation in any other for there is no other name under Heaven among men by which we must be saved it is only through Jesus Christ Romans 5 10. do you realize we were once enemies who have been reconciled to God we were once enemies till the Holy

Spirit got in there and saved us you know I want you to understand the pagans they're not the enemy the evolutionists The Atheist they're not the enemy the enemy is a false philosophy that they bought into what they need to understand is that is a false philosophy and they need to get back to the truth we need to be praying for them we want to see them come to know the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as well Hebrews 2 3 how shall we escape if we neglect so great of Salvation we have a phenomenal salvation

to take to the world phenomenal one we need to take salvation to the world we need to share it with the world we need to share it with the pagans we need to share it to people you see we need to be transformed by the renewing of our mind and we want to see the world renewing their mind as well it's only through the blood of Jesus Christ that's how you have the removal of the Veil that's how you escape the snare of the devil that's how you have eternal life that's how you're saved from

death so let me leave you with this should Christians involve themselves in Halloween it's a good question isn't it it's a really good question let me give you some options that I've heard from different people I mean obviously consult your local church I'm sure just about any local church out there that stands on the authority of the Bible would say we've got to avoid the Pagan practices need to avoid that stuff there's problems with it you know I've talked to some people are saying you know what we're going to try to take it back let's

have a time we actually go back and talk about sacrifice and where sacrifice come from how that goes back to the Bible and how that points to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ I've had some people say maybe we can just avoid Halloween altogether you know it's tough to do you know I've got some kids and we can't even go into a grocery shop without seeing a whole aisle on Halloween it's tough to avoid it isn't it in fact at a local grocery store they pass out stickers to my kids that have a witch on

it There They are promoting paganism right there to your kids we see this all over the place breaks my heart to see that I mean do these same grocery stores pass out something that says Jesus is risen no they don't it's tough to just avoid it I had a three-year-old it hit me hard here recently when my three-year-old's turning forward said hey what are we doing for Halloween I said you know we're Christians let's have a talk and just sit down and talk with them see kids are hit hard with it it's all over the

place I've had some people say well maybe we can have an alternative for example some people do Harvest festivals there's nothing wrong with that praising the Lord giving thanks for what he's given to us there's nothing wrong with that a lot of people celebrate Reformation day I want to encourage that too by the way do you realize that the day that the 95 Theses of Luther were not nailed to the door there Wittenberg October 31st that was the final nail that triggered the Reformation a lot of people celebrate Reformation day I don't encourage that to

you by the way some Churches do Trunk or Treat you see uh it's quite interesting to see a trunk or treat because it involves getting a lot of candy to kids if you talk to kids and say you know what we have a problem with Halloween I'm not so sure you should be out there doing some of these things that these pagans are doing they say but what about the candy well there's Alternatives that you can do and if you give the kids a candy usually they're just fine with getting candy without having to celebrate

pagans aspects some people do prayer meetings offer kids candy during prayer meetings and stuff too you know there's a number of things and you know what I want to encourage you talk to your local church find out because you know what they've had to deal with it for years as well but here's what I suggest in all things Friends couch all this with the gospel let's not forget why we do this why we talk about these issues why we compare these things and go back and discern it next to the word of God it is

all for the gospel for the blood of Jesus Christ we want to take whatever it is and we want to use it to point people to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the same way when Paul went to Greece the altar to the unknown God he took something there within their culture and he used it to point to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ you see it's all for the Lord and Savior all right thank you [Applause] [Music]