Setting the Stage for an Evil Emperor

The Antichrist will be a man skilled in the supernatural and paranormal.

Is the stage being set? Yes, you read the headline correct. You can now get Christ Alignment readings online, and they look at this as good news.

Well, I think some of us would disagree. This is online witchcraft disguised as some kind of New Age Christianity. Welcome to Understanding the Times Radio with Jan Markell. Radio for the Remnant, brought to you by Olive Tree Ministries. Today, Jan visits with author Ryan Pitterson about the rise of the occult, New Age, paranormal, and more, and their invasion into the world and the church. Why are believers being fooled and seduced by the demonic?

And why aren't our churches preparing the saints for this battle? Here is today's programming. What we're going to see tonight is just smattering. Just give it a little teaser of where we're going to head.

Just a big overshot. Then we're going to get into individual studies and go down super deep and get educated in the occult, the dark arts. And it is on the rise, not just in the world. It's on the rise in the church. It's being popularized by Hollywood just in time for people to think, I don't need God. No need to repent. I can do whatever I want to do.

Don't tell me what to do. And they're going to get involved in the dark arts, magic, sorcery, witchcraft, Satanism. And that's the culture God said is going to be in the seven-year tribulation. And I don't think many people in the church even realize how far the occult has progressed.

Again, not just in the world, but in the church. Welcome to Understanding the Times Radio. I hope that was a sufficient tease. That was Pastor Billy Crone. He's not my guest. I'm going to say more about his online series on the occult as I move into the program, because I'm going to play a few clips from his teachings on this.

But I do have a special guest with me, and I'm going to bring him on in just a moment. I'd like to set the stage first to sort of compliment what Pastor Crone just said. This growing fascination of the occult, of the supernatural, of the New Age movement, sorcery, pharmacia, or drug-related sorcery. We've got familiar spirits. Honestly, what it says in Second Timothy 3 probably sums it up.

Maybe we don't need to go any further. Even with an introduction in the last days, evil is going to wax worse and worse. But my concern, and we'll talk about general rising sorcery, etc., we're going to focus at least for the first part of the program on how it's creeping into the church. My goodness, we're going to look at a little bit of Christ alignment.

We'll spend a few minutes on the Enneagram. Of course, I have a theory presented on this program many times, and I believe that a modern-day trigger for all of this was, of course, the Harry Potter series that blossomed now 20 years ago. And that made evil look good. It intrigued children who wanted to be like Harry, and so some of those children turned into teens and now young adults who are now pursuing the dark arts. But in the church, the growth of the occult and the paranormal in the church? Well, I am going back to the new Terry James book, Lawless, The End Times War Against the Spirit of Antichrist.

And of course, I contributed to this book, as did 16 other authors, and then I came to a chapter by my guest, Ryan Pitterson. It's titled End Times Embrace of Evil. He looks at the overall rise of the paranormal, my interest again, and we're going to talk about it in general, but we're going to start with how it is mushrooming in the church, because that troubles me more than just about anything. Obviously, we want to also talk about how we can be a light in this darkness.

We're not just going to sit here and talk about the dark arts, but you need to protect your loved ones from some of these things that are going on, bombarding everybody daily. What we speak about, it's growing in a staggering way, and it's going to blossom fully in the tribulation from which the church is absent. So, what we're seeing is clearly a run-up, a setting the stage for the tribulation. So, Ryan Pitterson, welcome to Understanding the Times Radio. Thank you for having me.

I'm so excited to be on. I enjoy your work, and we're going to say more about that as we move into the programming. But look, you say in your chapter you refer to a Pew Research survey that six in ten Christians, six in ten Christians, hold to at least one central New Age belief. Now, you ask, how could so many people who identify as born-again Christians hold beliefs so out of line with basic biblical Christianity? You ask that question. I don't know if that was rhetorical. Do you have an answer?

Yes, I do have an answer. I was asking the question rhetorically, and still part of me is still begging the Lord to know, how could this happen? As you said, this is written in prophecy. First Timothy chapter 4, we're told, the Spirit speaketh expressly than the latter times. Some shall depart from the faith. So we're talking about those who are in the church giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, and that's what we're seeing.

So we're seeing that once we have the leadership, we're talking about doctrine, we're talking about teaching. So once we see the teaching, embracing concepts that are not only just unbiblical but New Age and even a cult, you're going to have the congregation start being deceived and moving us closer to the strong delusion that will come in the Great Tribulation. You are blunt in your chapter, and I appreciated that, and you referenced—and let's talk about it here for a few minutes because we're going to talk about Christ's alignment—you even reference Bethel Church, Reading, California, and you suggest that they are engaging in the doctrine of demons, and you go into some of the aberrant things going on there, but their embrace of Christ alignment. And I do want to read a paragraph off their website because they are really saying, hey, we don't practice Christ alignment, but we're supportive of what's happening, particularly in Australia. I'll read that in just a moment, but talk to me for just a moment about Christ alignment. I'm going to play a clip about Christ alignment. If we were to put it in everyday terms, it's Christian tarot cards, and yes, whoever thought we'd be sitting here talking about Christian tarot cards.

Exactly, and that's really what it is. So they refer to them as destiny cards, but at the end of the day, what these cards are used for, they're cards with images on them and symbols that are used to give someone a reading about their future, which clearly from Scripture, Deuteronomy 18, this is divination. You are divining someone's future that is clearly forbidden and an abomination to God, and I've seen their statements say that these aren't tarot cards, and technically they're not, but they're using them in the exact same way, and furthermore, the company Christ alignment is not a Christian organization, an actual company that can manufacture these cards.

They talk about terms like Christ spirit, the Christ consciousness, and these are clearly new age terms for Jesus that refers to Jesus much more as a mystical guru or an avatar of a spirit that's been in many different great leaders and spiritual beings throughout time, rather than being the Son of God, the Messiah, and God in the flesh. Even the association that a church, much less one as large and influential as Bethel, would even want any affiliation with an organization that does not even acknowledge Jesus Christ for who he truly is. That should be very troubling to Christians, and this is why I had to be so blunt. I try to hesitate to name churches or name people because we're all at different stages in our walk, and we have to really be careful when we're judging, but when we're getting into this territory, it's really troubling, and I've seen videos of the events where they actually are using these Christ alignment destiny cards, and they're completely new age pick and events right alongside you have all sorts of occult practices taking place next to the booths where these cards are being used, and so it's deeply troubling.

Well, I'm going to play a little clip here. It's going to be Josh Peck and Steve Bancars from their book, The Second Coming of the New Age, talking about all of this, but let me read first what Bethel says on their website. They say there has been some concern about the ministry of Christ alignment and their supposed use of Christian tarot cards and ministering to people at new age festivals. While the leaders of this ministry are connected with several members to our community, the community being Bethel Church right in California, then they go on to say Christ alignment is not formally affiliated with Bethel, and then they conclude we do, however, have a value for what they are seeking to accomplish. Let me just play, it's a two minute clip here of new age experts, particularly Steve Bancars, former new ager, and he's talking here about the seriousness of this Christ alignment. I read recently on one of the most bizarre headlines I've seen in the church for a long time, that there's this kind of Christian tarot card reading thing happening right now. And when I saw that, I thought, oh, okay, it's like this one bizarro church out in Ohio somewhere or something. That's not going to happen.

That's not going to fly. And then the further I got down the article, I started realizing that's a thing. It's like popping up everywhere.

What is that? And how have we gotten so misguided that in the church, there would be that kind of a practice? And what does it mean? Well, I think real briefly, and I'm going to turn it to Steve and he wrote a lot about this in the chapter, but I think it's that most Christians, when these new age things happen, they do kind of have that attitude of, well, that's just one crazy church somewhere. It's really not that big of a deal. And then they ignore it and they don't expose the heresy. And that allows it to grow and grow and grow. And it goes slowly. It's like the frog in the pot of boiling water.

It grows slowly. And so slowly that a lot of Christians don't realize it until a couple of generations go by and then our kids are brought up in it. They think that it's normal and it gets more and more normalized. So I think that's why it's becoming more prevalent. Why all this, all this new age stuff in the church is becoming more prevalent and why we had to write this book, but specifically on the Christian tarot cards.

Oh yeah. It is more or less facilitated by a pretty wonky ministry. But the problem is that the ministry is condoned and publicly defended by one of the largest ministries in the world, in America, publicly defends and pushes this other ministry. They support them.

They're their friends. They believe in their practices. It's called Christ alignment. Christ alignment, we mentioned in the book. So you can go on Christ alignment's website and you can learn about how these cards are more accurate than tarot cards for the readings that they give, right? What do you mean the cards are more accurate?

Do you mean Jesus is more accurate? The cards don't have any accuracy in and of themselves, unless you're a spiritist and unless you're a diviner and you believe that cards are somehow linked to archetypes and energies in the universe, in which case then yeah, cards can have accuracy. But the fact that they say the cards have more accuracy than tarot shows that their words testify.

They're not deriving their knowledge from the right place. And they actually say these cards, we tap into the divine energies of the Christ spirit. What is the divine energies of the Christ spirit? Right.

That is so vague. Do you mean the Holy ghost? Do you mean the Holy spirit? Who's a person that he tells you things?

There is no divine energy of Christ. You're listening to understanding the times radio. If you just joined me, that was the voice of Steve Bancars. And he was talking about his book, The Second Coming of the New Age. We're not featuring that. What I am featuring this hour, I've gone back to Terry James' book, Lawless End Times War Against the Spirit of Antichrist, because my guest on the line from Texas, Ryan Pitterson, has contributed a chapter titled End Times Embrace of Evil. And if the name Ryan Pitterson is familiar, you've probably read or heard him talk heavily about the Nephilim.

And you can learn more at his website, judgmentofthenephilim.com. That's not our topic. I'll have Ryan back another time to talk about that. But I want to talk about this rise of the occult and the new age and how it's hitting the church, Ryan, only in the interest of time. I'm moving on to something else you write about, and that is the Enneagram. It is so popular in today's church and it works with supposedly nine personality types. Why is this dangerous for a church?

What is the potential harm? And I know it encourages those using the Enneagram to focus on their own wants, needs, desires, history, emotions, and fine tune their own true self. To me, this sounds wildly new age, but it's in the church. The Enneagram, I think, is even more troubling and disturbing than even the Christ alignment cards, because it's much more popular. As you mentioned, I'm in Texas in the Bible Belt, and there are many what would be considered mainstream evangelical churches that do teachings on the Enneagram. Even have shirts. You'll see people from the church on social media with shirts with their Enneagram number on their shirt.

They'll say, I'm a six, I'm a seven, I'm a two. And so this has somehow been even more subtle and more accepted than something like a Christ alignment destiny card. And really, it goes back to the same thing. It's the origin, just like the Christ alignment group is new age. The origins of the Enneagram have absolutely nothing to do with Christianity. And the first person to really write about the Enneagram in a book was a Russian mystic named P.D.

Opensky. This is back in 1917. He wrote in a book called In Search of the Miraculous. In the book, he credits his mentor, George Gerta Jeff, as the creator of the Enneagram. The reason why that matters is because once we know that, that we can see Gerta Jeff was not only an occultist, he was a disciple of Madame H. P. Blavatsky, who headed the Theosophical Society, who was a Luciferian.

And this is the creator of the Enneagram. So the history of this practice goes directly back to a Luciferian, essentially. And so there's an extreme spiritual danger there.

And then the teaching itself, when you even see how it's taught in the church, it has nothing to do with the Bible. For example, one of the biggest conference speakers, a woman named Susan Sabille, who travels to many churches all year round, preaching and teaching on the Enneagram, it's about understanding yourself, like you said, how you become your authentic self. There's this notion that we have moved away, that we were made as this almost perfect individual. And somehow as we've left childhood to adulthood, we've moved away from that spiritually. And the Enneagram identifies who we truly were. And it brings us back to that more perfect God-like person.

And this is the opposite of Scripture. Psalm 51, David says, we are shaped in iniquity from the womb we have sinned. The story of the Gospel is that we are born sinners, and we are redeemed by a sinless Savior, not that we were once these perfect beings at our birth.

And then over time, we just forgot who we were. And a number brings us back, you know, it's Christ to redeem. So it's almost replacing Christ and putting the focus on this number and a search that's all about ourselves and not glorifying Christ and letting Jesus live through us. As you say in the book, the teens of today, and for that matter, all age groups, with this occult preparation, they're going to accept those that aren't raptured with the church, the supernatural man, the Antichrist, who will dazzle the masses with his supernatural abilities. And I think that's the point of, obviously, Terry James' book, but also your chapter is warning against this. And you talk about it, and I'm so glad you did, and I want to talk about it here for just a minute. Folks, we're only given subject matter within the chapter, literally minutes. I think Ryan's written the longest chapter in the book, the most comprehensive.

He's tried not to miss anything, and that's hard to do when you're only contributing a chapter to a book and not writing an entire book. But the energy and crystal healing, it's a booming industry. Christians are toying around with it. Supposedly stones have some sort of metaphysical healing power, which I think many listeners know is nonsense. Nonetheless, it's a billion-dollar industry, which I learned in your chapter.

I didn't know it was that popular. The energy crystals, or they call them healing stones, it is super popular, certainly with teens, with millennials, and celebrities have been a big contributor to freely promoting this idea that you can buy these stones that carry either healing properties or channel a certain energy, whether you want to be successful or you want a romance stone. There are all these different stones that allow you to channel different spiritual power, and it's a booming industry that unfortunately is also infiltrating the church. What might happen, and maybe this is speculation and conjecture here, Ryan, talking to Ryan Pitterson, to a Christian practicing energy healing, crystal healing.

What's the worst-case scenario? When it comes to the spiritual forces, it's like Ephesians 6, who we wrestle against, that if we are opening ourselves, our bodies, our homes to the occult, to satanic or demonic forces, we are now giving them access to corrupt us or corrupt our home. It allows us to give no space to the devil, and so I think that any time we're allowing something like energy stones or the Enneagram to come into our faith, and what we do every day as a part of our worship, it's that leaven that's going to leaven the whole lump and soon pull us away towards apostasy. And like you said, what this is all about, the endgame of everything we're talking about from the enemy's perspective, is laying the groundwork for the worship of Antichrist, who will use occult satanic, supernatural powers given by the devil. This is all pulling us, society, to a point that we can accept these things and embrace them. The more it can infiltrate the church, the more it can pull not only people into apostasy, but think about, say, adults who are doing Enneagrams, what are they teaching their children? If you have a quote-unquote Christian household where the parents practice the Enneagram or using energy stones, Christian tarot cards, how is the next generation being raised? They're even further away from anything that's soundly doctrinal. You write about the harlot of Revelation riding the beast decked with precious stones.

What is the application you're making to our topic today? We know that the devil is an imitator, right down to the Antichrist, who's just a complete satanic mimic of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so I think even with stones, when we go back into Scripture, we see that stones matter to God. You know, when I write about the breastplate of the high priest that Aaron was given, and the stones that are specifically described by God, and that they had a supernatural purpose that we see with Joshua and David, they were to use the urim and the thumim, which of course means lights and perfection, to divine the will of God. And Satan, taking that, has used it for his own evil purposes, this idea that these stones have some purpose with God. And again, we also see in Ezekiel 28, it says that Satan himself was an Eden in the Garden of God.

It says every precious stone was by covering. So even in the angelic realm, this idea of these stones that God has selected having some type of significance on a spiritual sense is biblical. The devil, of course, takes those things and uses it to put the focus on him, or for a person who's being deceived by the devil, put the focus on themselves.

The energy crystal movement is all about getting things for yourself, healing your body, or getting the person you want to marry, or more money in your career. So it all goes back to you can be as God. Genesis chapter three, the initial promise that was deception of Adam and Eve is all the same thing, just packaged differently. Talking to Ryan Pitterson for the hour, and I'm basing the discussion off the chapter in his book End Times, Embrace of Evil, because he's contributed to the lawless book that we carry. It's in our online store, OliveTreeViews, views as in viewpoint, OliveTreeViews.org, and it has 17 contributors to the book. I'll name the contributors later, and we've talked about the book, and we'll continue to talk about it into the next couple of months, because the contributors have done just an outstanding job of contributing substance. But when I read Ryan's chapter, oh, a couple months ago now, it just jumped out at me as being so relevant to today. And you know, Ryan, there's something that's happened here in the world in the last 50 years, and you do include it in your subject matter. And that would be how drugs or pharmakeia are playing into our generation. This has only been the last 50 years or so. This has been such a major player. I want to play a real quick sound clip again of Pastor Billy Crone talking about how our times have changed so dramatically, and particularly the magic arts, because of pharmakeia that comes right out of Revelation, pharmacy, drugs, etc.

Now, of all bizarre things, we have our government legalizing drugs to make a profit and compounding the disaster. We know that people can get saved in the seven-year tribulation. We certainly see that with the 144,000 male Jewish witnesses. We certainly see that with the two witnesses. We also see that God's going to send an angel to declare the eternal gospel. So even in the midst of judgment, God's giving people an opportunity to turn to him and get saved before it's too late.

But these people here are so stinking wicked that they say, absolutely not. They refuse to repent, and there's a whole litmus of evil, wicked behaviors that are being done during that time frame. Now, where I want to focus on is the one that says they're magic arts.

It says they did not repent of their magic arts. It's the Greek word pharmakeia, which guess where we get the English word from? It's the English word pharmakeia or pharmacy. And when you go to the pharmacy, what do you get? You get drugs, okay? And that's what that word means.

It means drugs or druggings. And so this gives us a clue, why in the world would these people absolutely, even though they're being bombarded by the wrath of God, the judgment of God, horrible things, Jesus said it's the worst time in the history of mankind, all kinds of calamity. You already had one fourth of the earth being annihilated, nearly two billion people. Here comes another third of mankind is being wiped out just in this judgment alone, and they still won't repent.

Why? Because of drugs, drugs and druggings. Massive amount of drug usage is apparently going to be clouding their minds. And dare I say, as we've seen before in some of our other studies, and we're going to see in the occult, drugs are one of the ways that people get induced into an altered state of consciousness that opens them up to literal possession of spirits, specifically demon spirits. The planet is going to be full of pharmacare at this time. And dare I say, people are probably demon influenced and demon possessed. So no wonder they're not turning to God.

That's one reason. But it's a good thing we don't see any rise of drugs and drugs being made popular and legal today. Turn on your TV, what do we see? We got drugs this, drug that, drug problem here. There's a drug raid going on here. Drugs in school, drugs in homes, drugs in the street, drugs in the government, drugs around the world. Oh, and by the way, our government, even in the United States of America, is legalizing formal illegal drugs and making a profit. Everybody's doing drugs today, just in time for a drug induced crazed culture to appear on the planet in the seven year tribulation.

But that's not all. The word there, pharmacare, the word there, magic art, means not just drugs or druggings. It means, listen, drug usage that's fostered by the dark arts. It's not just drugs. It certainly has that connotation, but it's drug usage fostered by the dark arts.

Now, that's why in some of your translations there, you're going to see that word translated, maybe not magic arts, but specifically sorcery, or in some translations, it's translated as witchcraft. That was Pastor Billy Crone. Look up his full teaching on the paranormal, the dark arts on YouTube, on his website, getalifemedia.com.

Does an excellent job. Ryan Peterson, do you want to comment on that? I agree with Pastor Crone 100%. It's really important to understand that connection.

I'm so happy that he pointed that out. The connection between drug use and, again, access to the satanic or demonic spiritual realm. What I pointed out was that we see that pharmacare when you look in the Greek Septuagint, which of course is the oldest Greek version of the Old Testament, we actually see that word for Jonathan Jombres, the Pharaoh's two sorcerers in the Exodus. They were using pharmageos as enchantments, but the Greek, again, is pharmageos. When they were turning, when they were matching Moses's miracles and turning the river to blood, that's what they were using was pharmageos. And of course, look at the power that they were able to wield. They were able to match the three first plagues of God. It's a particularly dangerous practice, and it's becoming obviously so much more prevalent and normalized and accepted.

It's not even going to be illegal anymore to do many drugs that you could go to prison for just a couple of years ago. So I agree, and I think also it does indeed give credence as to how the world could be so stubborn in their refusal to repent during the Great Tribulation, when you have these cataclysmic judgments taking place, and yet their hearts are just hardened like Pharaoh's was in the Exodus. The people will not repent, but they continue in their sorceries, as we see in Revelation 16. My guest says this in the book. He says, in these programs, and now we're talking about the entertainment industry, and we need to head there in part two. In these programs, witches, wizards, and fallen angels are the heroes in sympathetic figures who are just misunderstood by ignorant parents. He says their fellow occult practitioners are exciting, they're intriguing heroes who are living better lives than normal human beings. This drives home the fact that there is great power and promise in magic. Ryan writes that in this chapter, and indeed, we have particularly a younger generation absolutely enamored with some of the issues that we're talking about, and I'm just going to say this, and we'll perhaps hit it in part two of my programming. I think one of the things that unleashed this, as I referenced in my intro, was back in 2000, the Harry Potter series came along.

JK Rowling, she was quite open about her infatuation with all things occult, and for that matter, the occult thanked her for what she did in unleashing Harry Potter on the world. I hear from Christian parents all the time who are praising Harry Potter. I don't get it, but again, they'll say, well, my kids are reading, so it's worth it. No, it isn't, folks.

It isn't. And if I have time, I'll play a clip of the late Carol Matriciana and what she has to say about that kind of entertainment coming into the home. Any of the kind of entertainment. I mean, there's dozens of it now, particularly available on Netflix and other places. My goodness, you've got the Lucifer series on Netflix. I'm going to take my midpoint break, but I'm talking for the hour with Ryan Pitterson, who contributed a chapter in the Terry James book Lawless, End Times War Against the Spirit of Antichrist. His chapter is End Times Embrace of Evil. You can reach Ryan at judgmentofthenephelim.com, judgmentofthenephelim.com, and when I come back, we're going to wrap up our discussion, but we've got a lot to hit yet.

My goodness, I never thought I'd see the day when some things that are just blatantly evil and wicked, and we opened with how they've entered the church, and that's my burden, is the fact that they've entered the church, but they've entered the world and the church. We'll talk more about it in just a minute or two. Don't go away.

Don't go away. Bible says in 1 Chronicles 12 that God was pleased with the sons of Issachar who understood the times. Are you keeping up with the significant breaking stories today? If not, check our daily headlines posted at our website, olivetreeviews.org. We post other articles in various categories as well.

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We'll get through this new year together as we await His return. This is why it's important that we speak out and warn people of the truth behind these things, that these are demonic forces at work, because absent us warning and being the watchman on the wall that God commands us to be, people are just falling for this left and right. A paranormal practice is any attempt to access the spiritual realm without God, as this will inherently involve interaction with fallen angels and demons. Our programming is sounding this alarm today, and we hope it is helpful, sobering, and timely in your life. The church is not only not exempt from this, it is a virtual target.

Here is the conclusion to today's program. Notice how many different ways that this rise of the occult is being encouraged. Several different ways that we saw tonight in the different categories of the occult. We certainly saw music was being used as a platform.

Lord Willem will get into some stories. I know people involved in the music industry. Tell you what, man, it is all about the occult, and it isn't just rock music. It's a bunch of different genres, but they're using that as a platform. In fact, some of the people in the music industry, they admit that the concerts, that is their pulpit to get their message across.

Again, like you saw in the example tonight, but music is a big one. Drugs, as we talked before, certainly fits what Revelation said, pharmacaia, drugs used in the dark arts. So drugs are being used as well to encourage people into that. Also notice the immoral aspect of it.

It's basically, hey, no holds barred. You can do whatever you want, however you want to live, whatever you want to live, whatever you can do, come one, come all. And that certainly is being encouraged in our immoral societies today on a massive basis. We also saw it's being encouraged by certainly Hollywood.

I think that's a given. Unfortunately, people have been brainwashed to think that Hollywood is just about entertainment. Oh, it's just a show about vampires. Or that's just a show about witchcraft. I know it's an entertainment.

No, it's not. It's indoctrination. And we'll get into that extremely deep, Lord Willem, where much of the material that's being put out in Hollywood and even in books, including the Harry Potter series, contains actual witchcraft, spells and things. So people are being indoctrinated.

But again, the whole process is desensitizing people as well. We also saw how the internet is being used as a platform to encourage people to get involved, to get acquainted with the occult, which people can get anywhere. Used to be back in the day that if you wanted to get involved, unfortunately, in the dark arts and things of such nature, you would have to somehow go to some seedy backwoods downtown freaky in a back alley bookstore, and you might be able to find some of these materials. Not anymore. They're out there in the open on the internet and not just adults, kids, anybody can get access to this stuff. And a lot of it you don't have to buy, they just post it online for free. Okay, again, that was Pastor Billy Crone and his series on the paranormal.

Look it up online on YouTube. Point he's making is that this is just out in the open now. At one time it was hidden. I think that's what the occult means is hidden.

Well, no longer. Do you remember the witches? First, they were trying to put a hex on President Trump for much of his term of four years. And then Justice Kavanaugh, they were putting some sort of curses on Brett Kavanaugh.

This is now a couple of years ago. The point is they're so brazen. They're so out in the open. And then the internet has made things so much more complicated because the internet is giving free instructions on the occult and the paranormal and how you can practice all of these things. And as we said in the first half of the program, even introduce them to your church. Speaking of big tech and internet, you know that a lot of ministries are having big problems with big tech.

Let's just put it that way. So just a heads up here that for now you can find us on some of the main platforms. We're still on Instagram. We're on Facebook. Facebook's cutting our followers back. It's cutting our Twitter followers back. I don't know that we'll be on Facebook and Twitter much longer.

We're on Rumble. We're on YouTube when they don't censor us. We're on Gab.

It's just really, really frustrating. You can find all of our radio videos and audio on my website. OliveTreeViews.org. OliveTreeViews.org. That's the best way to stay in touch with us. Best way to keep up with articles, radio programming, videos, etc. Even the online Prophecy Roundtables that I do all posted to our website in that some of these other platforms are, well, they're just going sideways.

Grateful the gospel is getting out, nonetheless. I'm spending the hour with Ryan Pitterson because, again, he's an author. He's a commentator. He's an attorney. You've seen him on various prophecy programs, Prophecy in the News, and others. I'm so impressed with his writing, and I'm just referring right now to his chapter on page 153 where he says, and again, this is End Times, Embrace of Evil in the Terry James Lawless book, and he says this on this page, even from a nonfiction standpoint, there is an abundance of instructional guides for children on the occult. A quick search reveals titles such as, now get this, folks, this is titles in our schools, in our libraries across the country.

Just a few. The Junior Witches Handbook, a kids guide to white magic spells, rituals, magic potions, elixirs, recipes, and spells for kids in magic training. Another one. The Book of Wizard Craft, in which the apprentice finds spells, potions, fantastic tales, and 50 enchanting things to make. Number three. My First Spellbook, a magic workbook for young witches. These are kids books in our public schools and libraries. Number four. Invincible Magic Book of Ancient Spells, Charms, and Divination Rituals for kids in magic training. Number five. I'll stop here. The Earth Child's Handbook, Book One, Crafts and Inspiration for the Spiritual Child. Ryan Pitterson, that last one, for the spiritual child. That means kids in church right, no, wrong.

Exactly. And really, if there's one alarm I can sound from this chapter, this is the biggest one, is this is about the children. You mentioned already that this is in our libraries. I've walked in these libraries.

I have two young children. When we were in the library, I'm in the children's section. Walking the aisles, easily 90% of the books are in some form connected to the occult, whether it's witches, warlocks, fallen angels, fairies. So our children right now, and young children, elementary school age, they are being bombarded with the occult, with witchcraft, with magic, and everything possible to make it as exciting and fun and appealing to them as possible. Well, you say, I'm reading from your chapter here, with this upbringing, of course, the teens of today will be willing to accept a messianic figure empowered with real witchcraft. When the beast emerges on the scene, the Bible prophesies that he will dazzle the masses with supernatural abilities. And Ryan Pitterson, we're being so conditioned, but I think particularly children, teens, and young people are the ones who are, well, they're falling for it.

Exactly. And that's where it's leading. It's leading to the worship and the embracing of the Antichrist, the false messiah, and his miracles. Even now, in the children's literature that's being written today, many of these books quote scripture. There are children's literature that talk about Nephilim, fallen angels, Genesis, Noah, the flood, and of course, like the devil, they take God's word, a little bit of truth, and mix in a lot of deception. The central character of the book in many of these stories is often a messiah. They're often saying that this fallen angel, or a child of a fallen angel, is fulfilling a prophecy from many millennia ago that they are this chosen person who will somehow prevent the world from being destroyed or save humanity. So even the idea of a false messiah himself is actually in many of these books.

One in particular, a series called The Fallen, which was not only a book series, but it was also a miniseries on ABC Family Channel, specifically was about a young boy who, when he turned 16, developed superpowers, and it's told that he's a Nephilim. He is the prophesied redeemer. And not only do we find out through the story that he has the power to redeem fallen angels, but ultimately, when he has to confront Satan, Satan revealed that he is his father.

So the seed of the serpent is the hero of the book. And so this type of really sinister and this deception is being put in lots of the literature today for children and teens. I maintain that the groundwork was laid again, I'm repeating this third time I've said at this hour, the groundwork was laid with Harry Potter, and I'm just going to play the late Carol Matrisciana, good friend, we all lost some three or four years ago. She was warning 25 years ago, Potter came along 20 years ago, but she was warning that from day one, folks, this is going to change society as we know it, and she's right. Joining us now to help answer some of those questions is Carol Matrisciana, who is an expert on the occult. She's the creative director for Jeremiah Films and has produced a documentary called Harry Potter Witchcraft Repackaged. Carol, it's a pleasure to have you here with us today.

Thank you so much. You know, there are a lot of people out there right now who are saying, oh, here go those Christians again. They're on another soapbox. Why should Christian parents be concerned about a film that's being sort of touted as harmless? Well, first of all, let's see what Warner Brothers says about the film. Warner Brothers says that it's an accurate portrayal of witchcraft. So here we have witches across the nation endorsing Harry Potter, saying that more than any other time that Harry Potter has initiated such response to witchcraft that witches now have schools of witchcraft on the internet where children can come get certificates of graduation to become witches. And of course, the books have been promoted by Scholastic Ink, who have been the providers of curriculum for 80 years in public schools. So here, where religion, where Christianity has been taken out of the schools, or all religion indeed, here we have a wizard, Harry Potter, a witch who goes to school with 350 other students to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, which has been repackaged as a reading incentive program promoted by Scholastic Ink, the publishers, in our schools.

32 million children a year are being reached by witchcraft repackaged. And J.K. Rowling herself, who is the author, says that she took more than a third of the research and the content of these so-called fantasy books from occult research. So she has drawn from history.

She has drawn from mythology. She admits that she has drawn from the religions of Celtic, Druidic, Satanic, Wiccan, pagan roots, and written them into her fiction books for children. Now there would be a lot of people who might not even know what the Bible has to say about any of this, who would say, but if my kids are just going to enjoy this and they're not engaging in the practice of any of this, what's the harm? The harm is, first of all, that witchcraft is being normalized to our children. For the first time in the history of the world, witchcraft is being given to children in a children's format, and children are seeing other children practicing it and say it's all right. And especially if the parents are saying, well, it's OK to read about other children being involved in this religion, then children say, well, if they can be involved in it, so can I. Now remember that the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is actually teaching many of the basics that are in the religion of witchcraft. The Supreme Court has given witchcraft religious status.

The IRS has given it tax exemption. So this is a religion, and this religion is being promoted through a child's level through the public schools on our tax dollar, and teaching the children by occultists how to mix potions, how to put emphasis on certain spells, how to twist your arm and your wrist, and how to concentrate when you want things. And the powers that Harry is tapping into are the powers that children think they can have. And people will say, oh, well, my child doesn't practice those things.

But there is also a morality that is being taught. Harry cheats. Harry lies. Harry steals. His teachers steal. When Harry breaks the rules, the teachers don't punish him. In fact, teachers say that rules are there to be broken. So children are learning a moral worldview that is not based on biblical principles. You're listening to Understanding the Times Radio, Jan Markell, spending the hour with Ryan Pitterson. You can contact him and learn more about him at judgmentofthenephelim.com. Ryan Pitterson, if you had one word, or take your time, please, of exhortation to parents this hour, what would it be?

And again, take your time. Know what your children are reading. If you are old enough to let your child have a phone of their own or a tablet of their own, you have to have full access, use parental apps, know the content that they're looking at what they're setting their eyes on. That is the most important thing beyond teaching the Bible to your children and praying with them daily is knowing what they're looking at what they're reading, what's coming into their phones, what's coming to their tablets because they are being bombarded with satanic influence. You write in all these shows meeting entertainment, witches, wizards and fallen angels are the heroes, the sympathetic figures who are just misunderstood by ignorant parents and authority figures. Their fellow occult practitioners are exciting, intriguing heroes who are living a much better life than normal human beings. All of this repeated messaging drives home the idea that there is great power and promise in magic and the occult and paranormal. The book of Isaiah describes the spiritual state of societies that embrace and celebrate these demonic trends. And of course, you cite Isaiah 5-20, one to them who call evil good and good evil and put darkness for light and light for darkness.

And Ryan, we're in such an upside down world right now. Absolutely. And of course, we talked about the books, but certainly on TV, we see the same pattern. You know, I mentioned some of the TV shows that you referenced there, like American Horror Story, which I think is definitely one of the most satanic forms of entertainment ever created. But they had one season specifically about young girls at a boarding school for witches that had human sacrifice, really real rituals being done.

Yeah. And a lot of these things really focus on young girls. The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, a reboot of a show from the 90s was about a teenage girl. She finds out that she's a hybrid, that she's a part witch and part normal human being just going like Harry Potter or normal human beings are called Muggles.

She, of course, on her 16th birthday is supposed to participate in a ritual in which she signed something called the Book of the Beast and pledges her soul to the devil. These are very popular shows that children are watching every day. You hit on one point that's really important. And that's this idea of what these shows really reinforce that the occult is the more exciting life. Dabbling in the occult and witchcraft and learning these things is where the real fun and the cool part of life really is. And of course, for a child that temptation is so strong because children want to be cool.

They want to be exciting. You couple that with the nonfiction books, it's easy for a child to go from a Harry Potter to an American Horror Story witch show to actually practicing full on witchcraft. And you write, and this is going back to entertainment, in these programs, witches, wizards, fallen angels, they're the heroes, the sympathetic figures who are just misunderstood.

I think I said this earlier, misunderstood by ignorant parents. This drives home the fact that there is great power and promise in magic. I think, Ryan, we need to clarify that one of the big draws into what we're talking about, particularly for young people, is power. Apparently, they do get some power. Am I right?

RYAN Absolutely. It is a huge draw to think that you could have power over nature, over elements, over other people. And that we see it in Scripture, we see it in the Book of Acts, the young woman who was possessed by a demon who was a soupsayer, and when she was gaining her master's money. So we see that this power is real, that there is a real power. And of course, these are just the demons operating and possessing people to give them that power or the devil himself. There is a power there. And there is some truth in terms of it being actually real. We mentioned the Exodus earlier, where Pharaoh's magicians could really perform supernatural acts. Another aspect of it is that for some of these children, the young people, they're going to have real demonic experiences that are going to woo them and lure them even more. Of course, the ultimate fulfillment of this is going to be the supernatural power of the Antichrist and the False Prophet and the Great Tribulation. And they're promised that through some means, if you worship them, they're going to lead you to their satanic salvation, which I think it will be the mark of the beast. This is setting the stage.

In other words, everything we've talked about now for just under an hour, it's setting the stage for the supernatural activity of the Tribulation. It's desensitizing people, heavily young people, but not exclusively. My goodness, there are people of all ages who know people who are involved in this all ages.

Absolutely. Before moving to Texas, I lived in New York City. I worked in Wall Street for over a decade. And I know executives, other attorneys who have their own personal spiritual gurus who wear energy crystals and who go to Brazil or Peru for ayahuasca journeys. So this is becoming very mainstream, not just the children, but with every age group and demographic, unfortunately. And you say, according to you again, the consistent message is that practicing the occult is exciting, seductive, empowering. There's a way to access powers we can never have on our own. It's leading the unsaved and the deceived into the false promise of the devil that ye shall be as gods.

I want you to comment on that. This again is the original deception. This is why studying Scripture is so important. The Bible is telling you this is what the devil is going to do in some form or fashion to try and lure humanity into rebellion against God. As the church goes more into apostasy, people are looking for some connection. As the church moves into teaching prosperity gospel or some watered-down gospel, the occult and the new age are filling that void. People now learn, hey, I could have an energy crystal that could actually heal my body or could help someone want to marry me or help my finances, or I can go speak to a spiritual guru who can elevate my consciousness or tell me who I was in the past life. That power, that godlike power, is exciting to people.

It's a strong temptation. This is why it's important that we speak out and warn people of the truth behind these things, that these are demonic forces at work, because absent us warning and being the watchman on the wall that God commands us to be, people are just falling for this left and right and embracing it. Like I said, now it's common.

Even if you're a full-time professional adult who's going to school and going to college, it's totally acceptable to say, yeah, I'm going to see my spiritual guru or I'm wearing my crystal to work today. It's becoming mainstream. Other contributors to the book include Wilford Hahn, Bruce Truley, Damon Duck, Dr. Tom Hoffman, Nathan Jones, talking to Ryan Pitterson, Todd Strandberg, Jonathan Brentner, Pete Garcia, Mike Gendron, Don McGee, Tom Hughes, Jim Fletcher, Dr. Dave Reagan. It's a book edited by Terry James Lawless, End Times War Against the Spirit of Antichrist. Find it in my online store, OliveTreeViews.org.

Find it in my print, any newsletter, sign up online. I don't know when we've had a product, folks, that has gone over with a bigger bang here than this book, Lawless, and I've featured a number of the authors already on air. We will continue here into the next couple of months because each chapter is so cutting edge about our times and the lawlessness that we see.

My goodness, as we're recording this here in Minneapolis, Minnesota, we have the George Floyd trial about to begin. If you think you've seen lawlessness previously, just wait until this trial commences. I think you're going to see an explosion of further lawlessness that we need to be praying about. I hope you will be praying about it because that was such a tragic incident and it happened 20 minutes from where I'm recording, and it seemed to change the world almost forever.

I believe that if Christians can be praying against these kinds of incidents that they probably wouldn't even be happening. That was a terribly unfortunate one. Ryan, we need to wrap up this hour on a positive note because the Bible says, greater is he that is in us than he that is, quite frankly, controlling the world, because Satan does seem to be the god of this world, is what the Bible says. But how can we encourage folks? I'm down to four or five minutes, and I want to take time on this.

Please go ahead. So the thing to remember, and this is why it's so critically important to study Bible prophecy, because this gives us confirmation that the Bible is true. The apostles, the prophets wrote these things thousands of years ago, and here they are. We're living in the era where so much of this is coming to pass right before our eyes. Jesus told us that when we see these things coming to pass, that we're to look up. Our redemption is drawing nigh. So this tells us that the Bible is true, and that the time for Christ to take us up so we do not experience the great tribulation is coming. So we should take heart that we know how this is all going to end. Jesus is going to return, He's going to conquer the Antichrist and the fallen angels, the devil will be in prison for a millennia, and the Savior will restore righteousness and peace and justice in this world. And we're going to reign with Him. So we have a glorious ending to look forward to.

And yes, it's going to be obviously very unprecedented, tough times for the world. But what can we take with that? We can say, hey, we know the answer. We need to be like Noah, being preachers of righteousness, trying to get people on the ark. I love that passage.

I mean, I've written extensively about Noah in the days of Noah. It says, God closed the door of the ark. And that's so important, because I see that as a type and shadow of the rapture. God is going to close the door and say, my church is coming with me, putting her in my mansion, and closing the door for seven years. We have to use the time we have now to share these things and not just talk about them and talk about the bad, but warn people of how evil they are, and then point them to Christ, that there is eternal life, that there is supernatural, eternal life that we can receive today, if we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, that there is all the things that the devil is trying to promise humanity, all these deceptions Jesus gives to us freely. We can go to heaven, we can live forever when we trust in the Savior. So this should give us confidence in the Word and confidence in our Savior, and also motivate us to get as many people, whether it's our friends, our children, our grandchildren, our co-workers, our neighbors. We need to make sure we're sharing that gospel with urgency, because clearly the time is short before God's going to close the door and take us away. And we want to make sure we get as many souls as possible to know Jesus, no eternal life, and know they are forgiven freely of all the sins and deceptions of the enemy.

Very well said. I'm quoting you again in the chapter, the good news is that Jesus Christ will defeat the devil, the false prophet, the Antichrist. Jesus Christ will return to judge the nations to restore righteousness in this earth. He has provided an escape in the rapture for all who trust in him before the supernatural, devastating judgments of the book of Revelation are unleashed upon a world that has continually rejected and denied him. And then Ryan says, we must be like Noah, preaching righteousness and forgiveness of sins to the world before the flood.

We must have the bravery of Rahab, who defied the sinful society of Jericho for her faith. Like the apostle John, we have to share the future that has been written that the light of Christ may open the eyes of those who have been blinded by the enemy before the final end time delusion approaches. The signs are all around us. Trust the savior and proclaim his truth boldly. And then Ryan closes with, and when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, lift up your heads for your redemption draws nigh. I think, Ryan, I'm down to a couple of minutes here. You stumbled into eschatology or Bible prophecy.

Maybe it was a little bit by accident. Can you give me a minute on that? Sure. Going back to about 2007, I was definitely a student of the Bible, but not a student of Bible prophecy, but I was very much into politics. I stumbled upon, as you said, some articles that were pointing out that political events were converging with Bible prophecy.

That just blew me away. I really had to start studying the end times. I found ministries like yours and others way back then in 2007.

And that really became a part of my morning routine. I would just go to Bible prophecy websites, read articles and learn and study the scriptures. And it just really ignited a passion and fire in me to get into all these issues and led me to write in the books I've written so far. Folks, look them up at judgmentofthenephelim.com. We'll get into the Nephilim with Ryan at another time. You got to send me your book on that topic, Ryan. We'll talk about that later. I need to go out of the program. Thank you, by the way, for joining me today. Enjoy the conversation again. The book is Lawless End Times War Against the Spirit of Antichrist.

In my store, give my office a call, get on our various newsletter list. But again, what does it say in First John 4 for greater is he who is in me than he who is in the world? We know that the Bible says Satan is the God of the world, but the God of the universe who even created Satan is so much greater. We can sit back and laugh at this devious enemy. He ends up in the lake of fire for all of eternity. And he knows that time is soon, so he's ramping up activity.

So stand strong and rebuke him at every opportunity, and he will flee. I want to thank you for listening, and we will talk to you next week. OliveTreeViews.org. Contact us there as well, or call us Central Time at 763-559-4444. That's 763-559-4444. Write us at Olive Tree Ministries, Box 1452, Maple Grove, Minnesota, 55311.

That's Box 1452, Maple Grove, Minnesota, 55311. All gifts are tax deductible. Don't let our times get you down. Always keep in mind that as God orchestrates end-time events, everything is falling into place.