I found a fun Christian site called Lost Seed Ministry which has audio downloads advice and other treasures for teens struggling with things like suicide… and the occult. Funny that what amounts to alternative religious exploration is more or less equated to killing yourself here. But that’s a whole other conversation we could have.

Anyway, I though their description of the negative effects of the occult was worth a closer look:

The Occult is NOT something to toy around with, not even to amuse your curiosity because it has a price to pay. You can say you refuse to live by the laws of gravity, but they are still there. You can say you refuse to believe there is a God or satan, that there are no after effects, but the spiritual laws still apply whether you choose to believe them or not.

Some things after effects or during effects in the occult may be: Visualization of Figures others cannot see, Voices in your head or out loud you may speak with, a haunted feeling, depression maturing into suicidal thoughts, seeing unnatural things that appear very frightening, tormenting dreams, insomnia, fear to go to church, and many, many others can be included.

The after effects of dabbling in the occult will catch up with you, no matter what, UNLESS you do something about it. And the only thing you can do is accept Christ into your life and receive deliverance. Christ only, Period.

(Bold mine)

Now, that we’ve given them a chance to speak, there’s lots we could say here in response. First, I want to bring up something I’ve talked about briefly before, but which Christian anti-occultists always seem to miss. These Christian authors always say, “Don’t experiment with the occult!” And their main proof is simple “Believe me! I know!” And that’s it. Although rarely you’ll find somebody who used to be into the occult who became Christian; at least in these cases, these people are speaking from some kind of authority. They tried it out, found it wasn’t for them, and came to Jesus. But most of these authors are missing the point that what people who get involved in the occult are looking for is a direct experience of something. Call it God, the Divine, infinity, magic, whatever. As I wrote after watching the Last Temptation of Christ earlier this year:

There’s a conversation that happens in that movie between Jesus and I think one of the monks in the desert. The monk says basically that he’s jealous of Jesus because he himself can’t hear God’s voice. He doesn’t know what God wants him to do; he just has to feel his way blindly through it. And Jesus laughs, saying something about how knowing God’s will isn’t a blessing, that it’s torture.

It strikes me that many people who turn from organized or mainstream religions towards occult paths feel the same conflict as the monk in the desert. They want to hear God’s voice, feel God’s hand on their shoulder. They want proof, they want evidence and direct experience. Faith to them isn’t enough; it’s a failure, an excuse not to strive.

So for any serious Christians who are trying to put out a more effective anti-occult message, I think this is what you really need to address, rather than all that nonsense you’re always spouting about the hunger for power.

Anyway, going back to the original quote, I thought we could do them a favor and do an informal survey to prove or disprove what they are calling the effects of dabbling with the occult. Here are some of the items they list:

• Visualization of Figures others cannot see
• Voices in your head or out loud you may speak with
• a haunted feeling
• depression maturing into suicidal thoughts
• seeing unnatural things that appear very frightening
• tormenting dreams
• insomnia
• fear to go to church

If we were feeling really sassy, we could also sit down and comb through Bible passages for examples of holy people who experienced these same criteria without dabbling in the occult. Heck, even good old Jesus Christ himself is a likely candidate for having experimented with the occult, according to this list.

But anyway, my intention isn’t to start a big theological debate, but simply to test the validity of this list. If you’ve dabbled with the occult, have you ever experienced any (or multiple) of these items? Also, for people who have not ever dabbled with the occult, have you also experienced any of these things spontaneously?

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