Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1390 | ‘A Court of Thorns & Roses’ is Bad for Your Marriage. My Warning

Episode Date: August 31, 2026

Is Romantasy ruining reality? Allie unpacks the ACOTAR phenomenon, highlighting how the author of the series, Sarah J. Maas, is proud of the smut she writes, but she's even prouder that readers are leaving their boyfriends and husbands thanks to her work. While women should always leave an abusive partner, Allie believes ACOTAR is setting an unrealistic standard of romance for women that is causing them to throw away good relationships and self-improvement. Meanwhile, the Bible showcases far better examples of romance and strong, female protagonists than spicy novellas from BookTok. Allie is also joined by Share the Arrows guest speaker Costi Hinn, who discusses the similarities between Kathryn Krick and his uncle Benny Hinn and the broader dangers of the charismatic movement. Do you have a question for Allie? Leave a voicemail at 844-755-5252. Share the Arrows 2026 is on October 10 in Dallas, Texas! Tickets are on sale now at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sharethearrows.com⁠⁠⁠ Share the Arrows is sponsored by: A'del Natural Cosmetics: AdelNaturalCosmetics.com Range Leather: RangeLeather.com/ALLIE We Heart Nutrition: WeHeartNutrition.com Buy Allie's book "Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion": ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.toxicempathy.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ – Time Codes 0:00 Introduction 11:34 Sarah J. Maas & ACOTAR 25:17 ACOTAR Ruins Relationships 45:34 Biblical Femininity 56:34 Costi Hinn on Kathryn Krick – Today's Sponsors: Head to https://cozyearth.com and use my code RELATABLE for an exclusive 20% off. A'del | Visit AdelNaturalCosmetics.com and enter promo code ALLIE for 25% off your first-time purchase. Pre-Born | To donate, dial #250 and say the keyword “BABY.” Or visit Preborn.com/ALLIE. Good Ranchers | If you go to ⁠⁠⁠GoodRanchers.com⁠⁠⁠ and subscribe to any box of 100% American meat, you’ll save up to $500 a year! Plus, if you use code ALLIE, you’ll get an additional $25 off your first order. Take charge of your health expenses and be part of a community. Join CrowdHealth to get started today for $99 a month for your first three months using code ALLIE at joincrowdhealth.com. Episodes You May Like: Ep 1319 | Teen Fiction’s Dark Turn, Islamification Update & Reaction to Netflix’s Dino Doc https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-1319-teen-fictions-dark-turn-islamification-update/id1359249098?i=1000756011652 Ep 1240 | TikTok’s Spicy Novels Are Warping Women’s Minds https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-1240-tiktoks-spicy-novels-are-warping-womens-minds/id1359249098?i=1000725942755 --- ► Buy Allie's book, "You're Not Enough (& That's Okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love": https://alliebethstuckey.com/book ► Subscribe to the podcast: iTunes: https://apple.co/2UVssnP Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2FwkXxj ► Connect with Allie on Social Media: https://twitter.com/conservmillen https://www.instagram.com/alliebstuckey/ https://facebook.com/allieBlazeTV/ ► Relatable merchandise – use promo code 'ALLIE10' for a discount: https://shop.blazemedia.com/collections/allie-stuckey

Sarah J. Mass, she's got three different series that are really popular, a court of thorns and roses, Crescent City, throne of glass. These books are designed so that you will get sucked in. You will want to keep going. Even the implication of the things that are happening, I do think has an effect on our mind. It's not just the sex. It's not just the vulgarity. It is also just the idea that this is what a healthy relationship really looks like, that the alternative to this fictional character is abusive. That if your husband or your boyfriend doesn't reach his level, something's wrong with him. Something's wrong with love. Something's wrong with the world. That creates discontentment. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Worldwatch.

Go to worldwatch.com.com.com slash alley for your free trial, worldwatch.com. dot news slash alley. Hey y'all, welcome to relatable. Happy Monday. Hope everyone had a wonderful and peaceful weekend. Well, you might think it's strange that I'm not talking about the Lindsay Clancy case today, but that's because we always record our Monday episodes

the week before. So a few days in advance, as I am recording this, closing arguments are happening. We do not have a verdict from the jury today. But by the next time I record, hopefully we will have a verdict and we will be able to give you a full analysis of that. What we know for sure is that no matter what happens with our justice system,

no matter what happens in our personal lives, in our political system in this country, God's eternal plan of redemption is going off without a hitch. That God never gets justice wrong. He never gets the truth wrong. He's never confused about what's going on. He's never taken in by conspiracy theories. If you ever really want to know what's going on beyond the headlines,

beyond the mainstream narrative, you don't have to tune in to a podcast. You don't have to follow an influencer. You don't have to go down the rabbit holes on various social media platforms. You need to read the Word of God. Because what is really going on underneath everything is that God's eternal plan of redemption is going off without a hitch. He is completely undeterred.

He is completely uninterrupted. He is completely unhindered in seeking and saving the lost, bringing himself glory, advancing his kingdom, and doing everything that needs to be done in a according to his perfect will. He is totally sovereign. Nothing throws him off. Nothing takes him back. Nothing surprises him. Nothing catches him off guard. He's never looking down and saying, oh my goodness, how did this happen? How can I clean up this mess? So even when we look on social media and we are just so, we are so grieved by the state of the world and the moral confusion that exists. I mean, I feel that every single day. We can trust that we have a refuge of clarity,

that we have a refuge that brings us stability. And we have that in Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday today and forever, Hebrews 13, 8, yes and amen. And one day there will be no more evil. There will be no more justice system. There will be no more politicians. There will be no more lies.

There will be no more confusion. We will just live in perfect peace forever and ever with him because Jesus is coming back. And so our responsibility until then is to do the next right thing. in faith with excellence and for the glory of God. One thing that we are told in scripture is to make a good use of our time and paraphrasing because the days are evil. We're also told that Satan is prowling around like a roaring line looking for someone to devour. So that means that while we are not paranoid, we are on guard. That we read a passage like Ephesion 6, which tells us that there is a

spiritual war that is being waged at all times. In Ephesians 2, we read that Satan is the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience among whom we all once walked in the passions of our flesh, and we're by nature, by nature, children of wrath like the rest of mankind. Once we see that the spiritual reality is what is really going on at all times, that we're not going to find insight, the insight that we're looking for anywhere, except the word of God, that adds meaning to everything we think, say, and do. That we realize that nothing is neutral, that every single molecule has been claimed by God and counterclaimed by Satan in this cosmic war that is going on, even as we know that God will

one day declare victory forever and ever over Satan. But as this battle is going on, for our hearts, for our minds, for our devotion, our admiration, our attention, we have to take special care to look at the things that we are consuming. I know it's really easy to say it's just not that serious, the shows that we watch or the books that we read. It's just fun. It's just entertainment. And is it reading good for your brain?

I love reading. I have loved reading since I was a very small child and my mom and grandmother who were were both school teachers prioritized teaching me to read and teaching me a love of words from a very young age. And I've carried that with me my whole life. And in high school, I was super into reading all different kinds of fiction books. And while my parents were very strict about the things that I was consuming and the things that I was watching, there wasn't quite as much thought about the things that I was reading

and my friends were reading too. I was reading these romantician novels like twilight, like great. and terrible beauty, like Avalon High and all of these. And I mean, they would have been considered wholesome compared to a lot of the novels that we see today, but I look back. And what, for example, Twilight was teaching me about relationships, about love, about obsession and even, you know, sexual desire and all of that was not appropriate for a 16 to 17 year old girl to be reading because they were false ideas. I look back now and see that and as a mom of daughters,

I see how important it is to ensure that we are only focusing on that, which is good, right and true, including and maybe especially in the things that we read. And yet I see a lot of people carving out an exception for popular books, particularly this series by Sarah J. Mass that I have not read, but we did a lot of research on a court of thorns and roses. It is a wildly popular series, not only among book talk and non-Christian readers, but also among Christian women.

And if you haven't read it, I guarantee you, you have friends who read it. Your daughter has maybe read it. And despite what Mass says, the author about her hypersexual novels being, quote, more than smut, the picture that she paints of relationships, of morality, of sexuality, and the world are not. neutral. It's not neutral. And it's certainly not biblical. And I believe that these kinds of romanty novels are having an effect on how women, even Christian women, view men and view marriage, which then has an impact on children, has an impact on society. So the case that I want to make

today is, as someone who loves to read, loves fiction, and in the past used to read some of these similar novels is that Christian women should not be reading these books, really any of these books, but we're going to specifically focus on Mass's books. And if you are a mom, like my mom was, of a teen girl especially who loves these kinds of fictional novels and you're just happy that she's reading at night and not scrolling TikTok, I just encourage you to pay special attention to what we're going to be talking about in this episode. So first, we'll back up a little bit. and we'll talk about this genre of romanticcy. Maybe you're not even familiar with just how impactful this is.

And then I want you to start thinking, like, once I tell you the popularity of it, and as we go through some of the themes that we see in these books and other books, how do you see this manifesting in the world today? And maybe, I don't know, how women view the Lindsay Clancy case and how women view relationships, why women call themselves feminist, why women are pro-choice,

why there is this huge growing, between men and women, it's not just politics. It is also the entertainment we are consuming in how it is changing how we think about things and how we think about the opposite sex. So we'll get into that in a second. Let me pause and tell you that if you are a woman who is seeking truth, if you are a woman who is trying by the grace of God to be in the world but not of the world, as we all fallibly are, those of us who are believing women, I really encourage you to come to share the arrows on October 10th in Dallas, Texas. I have been having these meetings with each speaker just going through what the theme is

and what their talks are going to be like. You guys are in for such a special Holy Spirit inspired treat that day. And like I am too. I cannot wait to worship alongside you. I can't wait to learn alongside you with these women. We've got Elisa Childers. We've got Rosaria Butterfield. Shane and Shane will be leading worship. We've got Kostihan. Kostihan will be here at the end of today's episode, by the way, talking a little bit about Catherine Crick, Natasha Crane, Audrey Brogey, Grace and the Castleberry, y'all, it's going to be incredible. You are not going to find fluff here. You're not going to find the deception that we see in the world targeting women. You are actually going to be equipped with ways to fight against that biblically in every single realm

that you occupy. So go to share the arrows.com. This year are friends that Adele Natural Cosmetics are sponsoring. sponsoring, share the arrows. And I also want to tell you about Adele. I absolutely love them so much. They're so sweet. They reach out to me and they ask me, okay, are there any products that you need?

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So if you're wondering, okay, which of the foundations or which of the blushes is right for me, just reach out to them and they'll help you pick one out that works best for you. They're awesome. Pro-life, Christian, family-owned, just an amazing company. Adelaunnaturalcosmetics.com. Use code Alley for 25% off your first purchase. Adelnaturalcosmetics.com code Alley. Okay, so about a year ago, almost a year ago, we did an episode,

and we've done a couple of these episodes over the years, because this topic just keeps on coming back up and it seems to be more and more popular. increasingly popular. But we did an episode, I think it was maybe the end of August last year, the beginning of September, rather, called, it was about this idea of Romanticy novels, becoming more and more bizarre, more and more explicit, more and more fantastical, and ruining our perception or women's perception of reality and real relationships and what they actually look like in a really unhealthy way. If we look at this genre of Romantasy, which has become more popular with the explosion of book talk, the book reading part of TikTok, we can see that it generated, the

genre alone generated almost $1 billion in sales in 2025, $1 billion. And of course, the majority of those who are reading these books are women. Bloomberg recently reported in an article. titled the steamy, magical, and now very lucrative Romantici business that the sales for the Romantici genre in 2025 totaled just below $1 billion in the US. Okay. So I actually thought it was all over the world. This is only one, this is $1 billion in the US. And that is almost double the sales in 2023. So it's just interesting. And we'll get to this in a second that more and more women seem to be wanting to escape reality through these romantic scene novels. Now, about the books that we'll be talking about today, they're by Sarah J. Mass. This is who the author is. She's a,

she's a woman that is probably right in the demographic, represents the demographic of those who are reading her books. And she's got three different series that are really popular. As I already said, a court of thorns and roses. She's got Crescent City. She's also, got Throne of Glass, and I had only heard of a court of thorns and roses, but apparently all of the other ones are wildly popular too. Now, a court of thorns and roses is also abbreviated or not abbreviated, but people use this acronym, Akatar, so A-C-O-T-A-R, so I'm probably going to use that because every time I say the full title, Accord of Thorns and Roses, I want to say Game of Thrones. And so I don't know why. So I'm going to say Akatar, and that's what I mean.

She's actually adding Sarah J. Mass two new books onto this series in October of this year and then January of next year. So again, just a wildly massive success for this author. A little bit about this series. So here's the fantasy part of it. It follows a young human woman named Fyra. I'm going to do my best. I'm going to do my best in pronouncing all of these characters in her adventures.

and love in the Faye realm. So Faye is kind of like a fairy. It's a mystical, magical creature. So in the Faye realm of Prithian, the Faye are these immortal creatures and the books feature themes of love, war, and political intrigue. So the kinds of books that they are

and the plot of them are not really what we're focusing on today because that is common to a lot of these romanticcy books. It's their popularity that makes them so important to really talk about. So according to Mass's publicist, she has sold more than 85 million English copies of her books. Is someone who has written two books? Let me tell you, that's a lot of books. That's a lot of books in case you didn't know. Now, you're thinking of some other popular books and maybe you're wondering, okay, but Colleen Hoover, surely she has sold

just as many or Frida McFadden writing the housemaid. Maybe she's sold just as many. Those are indeed extremely popular books. They are not as popular as Sarah. are J-Mass. For example, it ends with us, has sold 1.8 million copies. Freedom McFadden, author of The House Made, 1.6 million copies. Rebecca Yaros, author of Fourth Wing, 1.3 million copies. The crowds for Yaros's latest book release, Onyx Storm, I've heard of that, which is in the same series as Fourth Wing. We're reminiscent of Harry Potter, so yeah, we're going to put up that. And this is, that's January 2025. So again, that's just to show you, like this is a book that sold a fraction of the number of Sarah J. Mase's books and yet, like,

look how popular they are. So that's just to give you an idea that this is really having a cultural impact. This is really having an influence on so many women and how they think about things. So the first thing that I want to talk about, we'll get into a little bit more of the plot, although again, that's not even the most important part of the discussion that we're having, but I will explain a little bit more about what they're about, especially when we get into the relationship aspect of this. But the first issue that I have as a Christian woman, as a woman who understands that we are supposed to focus on what is good, right and true, Philippians four, what is excellent, what is praiseworthy, is the level of so-called spice in Mass's books.

Now, spice means sex scenes. And you can see on books. book talk. I'm not on TikTok, but from what I understand, they use like a number of chili peppers to be able to indicate, okay, this is super spicy, like this is basically hardcore pornographic, or this is what is also referred to as a closed door romance where you know that they're going to have sex or do something, but you don't actually read about it. So the level of spice in Mass's books has increased over time. She had a debut series, Throne of Glass, that was mostly wholesome. There was some romance, but not a whole lot of sexuality. Next came Akitar, and this is the new adult series. The first three books included one to two sex scenes per book. These are

open door. Okay, so you're reading the descriptions of these sexual interactions between the characters. The fifth book in the series, A Court of Silver Flames, contains between seven or eight chapters with spice. It is significantly more pornographic with very very, very vulgar language used to describe sexual acts between characters. And this is the first book in the series that has real profanity. It has darker themes centered around PTSD. It is significantly more descriptive. And without question, pornographic, there are scenes that would last for full chapters in some cases with some of these things. And these books actually don't contain any profanity that our team could find up until the fifth book or reportedly they don't

they don't have any, you know, cuss words or anything like that until the fifth book. And it's interesting because we see this a lot with Netflix series too or series that you get so sucked into. Of course you're going to watch the next episode. You have to see what's going to happen. But after they hook you in, they get more and more depraved to where you kind of just get desensitized to it or you're like, well, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to find the resolution to the last episode in this one and I'll ignore the sex scene or all fast forward. I mean, it's the same kind of thing. I don't know if she started out this series intending that or if this is something the

publishers or the editors said, hey, we need to push people towards this. But it's not good. It's not good because you are so emotionally attached to all of these characters that then all of their physical lives start really affecting and impacting your mind as well. Her next series, Crescent City, is categorized as adult and follows the pattern of silver flames with significant cursing and pornographic scenes. And so that's just what you know you're going to get. And so one of the reasons why I would say do not read these books, even if you're like, well, the first few books, they're not that bad. You're not going to stop. They are designed so you won't stop. She's an excellent writer. That's why she sold millions of books. You are not going to want to stop. That's what I know about myself. I know that about myself. I know that about myself. I love to read. I love a gripping novel. I love fiction. And so if I read these books, I would not want to stop after the fourth book. I would want to keep going. And there is just a part of us who thinks that we are stronger than we are. We think we can filter out all perverseness and that it's not

really going to affect us, but that's not how God made our brains. We are very affected by the things that we consume. So if you haven't started, don't start. And if you, if you, are in the middle of it, just go ahead and stop. Yeah, it's going to be really hard to stop, but it's going to be harder the longer you go and the longer you keep reading. I promise, if you stop reading these novels right now and you just take a breather for a couple of weeks, you're going to lose the emotional attachment to it and you won't feel as compelled to keep going. And so I just think that we have to have the self-control not to get ourselves in a situation where we end up mentally sexually sinning. Like when I think about Jesus,

when he's like, you know what, it's better to pluck your eye out than to lust after a woman who is not your wife. Of course, he's not just talking to men about women who aren't their wives. He's talking about the problem of lust that it goes down to your heart. And like, okay, if he's saying it's better to pluck your eye out than to lust after another woman, that I think it's better to stop reading these novels than to lust after a fictional man. Now, Mass told Alex Cooper during a March episode of Call Her Daddy, so there you go. We got a sex podcast. and of course Alex Cooper wanted to have her on, she wouldn't have had her on

if she didn't think the books had some crossover with what she talks about. It's not like she's had, you know, Alex Cooper's not going to have Francine Rivers to talk about redeeming love on her show. She's going to talk to authors who are reading or writing about things that she likes to talk about,

which is largely, you know, vulgar descriptions of sex. Now, Sarah J-Mass says to Alex Cooper that she is proud of the sex scenes. But what she is prouder of is that women are actually leaving her husbands. She describes them as abusive husbands because of her someone. I just think in general when a lot of people hear that I write romantic fantasy, you know, like as much as I love my like steamy, sexy hot scenes, like this dismissal now of like smut where I'm like, yeah, I write smart.

Like, I love it. But, like, that's not what, like, my fans come up to me to talk about. Like, they, like, when they want to come thank me, like, it's like, yes, we giggle and laugh about, like, the hot scenes, whatever. But, like, they tell me how they left, like, their abusive husband after they read a court of mistin fury. Now, obviously, we believe that if you have an abusive husband that you and your children should go and be protected, that is not a question. of course, but there is a question of what Sarah J. Mask considers abusive. Because I see on TikTok by all of these feminists all of the time, you know, calling men who argue with them or disagree with them or who in their minds is not treating them well or said something rude as being abusive.

I think we've expanded the definition of abusive to include things that were never before seen is abusive. So when she's talking about women leaving their husbands, I'm like, well, is it really because of abuse, or is it because their husband could not live up to this fantastical depiction of what love should look like or what a romantic partner should look like? We'll get into more of this in just a second. Let me pause. Let me tell you about our next sponsor, and that is Good Ranchers. So I've talked to you a lot about the high quality, great tasting meat that we can get

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dinners together more likely by getting your box of Good Ranchers. It's sent to your front door on dry ice every month. Go to goodrangers.com slash Alley for a discount. Goodranches.com slash Alley. And so also I just want to point out that she said in that like I love Smut. I do right smut. It's great. So just remember that as we talk to you about this plot. Like it might sound, oh, well, that's not bad. Well, you just heard the author say that she loves smut and that she's proud that the wives are leaving their husbands for reasons that we don't actually know for sure.

But let me take you a little bit through this plot just so you understand maybe why this is so compelling. We'll put up pictures of what the author actually says, I guess, has confirmed these characters look like. And so first, we have the 19. year old human character, Fahra. This is apparently what she looks like.

She does not look 19. She falls in love with a Faye, a magical immortal creature named Tamlin. Here's what Tamlin looks like. Are you going to tell me he's 19 too? That's crazy. He's at first presented as a chivalrous, masculine love interest whose main goal is to protect

Fahara. I'm already forgetting how to say her name, who dies and is resurrected as a Faye herself at the end of the first book, Spoilers. Whoops, I guess you're just going to have to stop reading it now. In the second book, Fahara and Tamlin are engaged to be married, but Tamlin's behavior starts to change for the worse as he becomes more controlling. There's something very reminiscent about Twyla in here. He refuses to allow her to defend herself, almost kills her when he destroys a room with

his powers during an argument and goes as far as to confine her in his manner. And then she is rescued by her second love interest, whose name is recent, recent, I'm going to say, recent, whom she marries and is mated to by the end of book two. Fahra and recent are faded mates, a concept similar to soulmates, which is reserved only for the fay in the series and surpasses the importance of marriage. Again, reminds me of, remember imprinting? The concept of imprinting in Twilight? It was so weird. I saw a video making fun of that. I had completely forgotten about that,

but someone was making fun of the idea. Like, why did the character, like the adult character and Twilight imprint on a baby? So weird. But those are the things. Like, did I think about that when I was 16 or 17 years old reading these books? No, you're just consumed by the characters and by the story. And that it's not until you get out of these books and get out of that story that you're emotionally unattached and you can think critically, ugh, that was weird. That was a weird concept. And so you can see how all of these things start to kind of contribute to your thinking just about life and the world and morality and love.

As the author said, on call her daddy, women are apparently reportedly leaving their husbands that they're describing like the abusive character Tamlin. Now, as I said, could be that women are actually leaving their abusive husbands, getting protection. Okay, that is good. We want protection of this woman. But it could also be that these women are breaking off their relationships for shallow reasons. For example, there's an Instagram user, Valeria, reads it all, or Valeria, I don't know how to pronounce her name, published a video celebrating the announcement of the two new releases and said in the caption, Akatar is their reason. I asked for a divorce.

We'll put up the picture. This person's very excited about this. I'm not going to play the video. It's just kind of inappropriate and weird. But that's one example. She elaborated. She said that reading the novels helped her realize that she deserved an explosive, passionate, adventurous life and love.

Okay? She didn't say my husband was abusive. She didn't say my husband was like Tamlin. She said, I deserve more. You know what? I'm also going to play you. And this actually doesn't have anything to do with Akitar. But I just, this reminded me of another TikTok that I saw and I played on Instagram.

It reminds me of this. And just to show you that this is kind of a concept that comes up a lot when women read or watch fiction about their relationships. Here's a woman saying that heated rivalry made her leave her marriage. Heated rivalry convinced me that my marriage was over. So let's yap about it. My life right now is deep in the intersection of what a lot of us have experienced from watching the show and reading the books and what our real lives have been showing us. It just isn't the

way we want to move forward. I deserve sunshine and to be joyful. And so do you. And sometimes to get there, we have to pull the kip and walk away from the person who isn't showing up for us the way that we deserve. And it's hard and it sucks and it also can be the right thing to do. Okay, so she deserved sunshine. Again, nothing about abuse in there. Now, back to Akatar, there's this Reddit post that says that the book series and Reese's ruined her perception of love. She said, I'm reading, rereading one of these books and realizing it's ruined my perception of love because I don't think I could ever meet a man who would be as devoted and loving towards me as Reese was to Fahara. You're right, because he's not real. The bar is too high.

The way he teared up saying how much he loved her. He was so vulnerable and full of love. He said he was so happy around her and couldn't stay away. I'm 27. I've had two boyfriends and feel like all my naivete about love and real life is gone. Seriously, can't imagine experiencing a relationship like this in real life. At least I have the fantasy. Now here's something interesting that she says and just goes to show how far deception can go that she actually believes the opposite of what is true. She says, I feel like all my naivete about love and real life is gone. No, you are now extremely naive about how love and real life goes. Not to say that a man shouldn't be vulnerable and tear up when he says that he loves you and be super devoted to you and all of that. All of that can be wonderful.

But the idea of comparing real life, people, fallible human people, who do you, who do, deal with sin and get tired and get distracted and have their own things going on in life, comparing that to this, to fiction. This is an immortal person, by the way. This person is a fay, whatever that is. He's not even human. You're not even just comparing him to a fictional human. You're comparing him to a mystical creature and you're mad that your boyfriends

have it stacked up to that. That is very disturbing. We are seeking, it seems like, as a culture, a frictionless life with frictionless relationships, no inconvenience, no discomfort, no sanctification, no working hard, no getting through things, but just I deserve, I deserve, I deserve sunshine. But think about yourself for a second. Is that what you offer to a man? Do you offer perfection?

Do you offer unconditional and unwavering sunlight at all times? Like, is that who you are? No, it's not who any of us are. It's not who I am. We're all imperfect people. And yet I do think that women have become more and more used to, at least online, like holding men to a standard that you do not hold yourself. I mean, I do think, I'm sorry, but I do think about the whole Lindsay Clancy thing

and how there's just this unending compassion for this woman and her mental health struggles that you wouldn't have for Jeffrey Dahmer. you wouldn't have for Ted Bundy. You wouldn't have for a lot of the gang members that we see on the street, the illegal aliens that are committing horrific crimes. A lot of them probably had mental health problems and were on all kinds of medications. And yet I don't see this outpouring of support. And I think a lot of it has to do with this idea that so many of us have been conditioned

to think that women are always victims no matter what. Women aren't often victims. We are not always victims. And we certainly are not removed of. our agency and our accountability and our responsibility just because sometimes women are victims. So we see more and more of this on the internet with people saying these books have just, they've raised the bar for what they think that they should be able to find in a man. This guy that everyone is looking for who saves this main character, he's tall, dark, and handsome.

He's described as the most beautiful man imaginable. He's the most powerful man in the world and is a ruler, yet. is somehow always emotionally available and vulnerable for Therah. Is that so hard men? Is that so hard to be the ruler of the world and also emotionally available and accessible at all times? Come on. Women aren't asking for much.

He's protective and chivalrous, but also encourages her independence and helps enable her to be able to protect and defend herself. Ooh, she's a strong independent woman who needs a man to tell her that she's a strong and to pin a woman. Nice. Just a few months ago at a Benson Boone concert, the singer asked a girl in the crowd who her crush was. Here's what she said, sat too. Have you had a honey to have a crush before? Yeah. Okay. Can I ask what their name was? Can we do a made-up thing? Maybe. Reset? How does everyone know reset? He's from my book. What book? I'm not even pretend to know what you just said.

Okay, so majorly popular. It seemed like that person I couldn't tell that he was talking to was young, like a younger fan. So I do think that this is popular among young people as well. Now, it might surprise you after what we've talked about that there are also many Christian women who are positive about Akatar. And not only just reading it, because maybe you start reading it, you don't realize what it is, and you just keep going because you like it.

but are actually apologists for it, are actually saying, no, this is good. This is positive. We absolutely should be reading this. And that is what's troubling. So we'll go through some of those examples and then my response to that in just a second. Let me pause. Let me tell you about our next sponsor. It's cozy earth.

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Okay. So here is a Christian woman. She's on social media. And she is answering the question, would I read Akitar again as a Christian? Would she read Akita again as a Christian? Here's what she says. Sub three. The first book, A Quarter Thorns and Roses, there's maybe like two spicy scenes in the entire thing. There's more in the other two books. books, Acomaf and Ackawar. So for these three books, I would still read them now. There was nothing in these books that bothered me other than the spice now would bother me. But I could easily skip over that. They're skippable. It's usually like one chapter. No problem skipping that whatsoever. Now this is the book where my opinion starts to change about the series. Very heavy on the spice. like way more spicy than any of the rest of the Akatar series. So that's a person who is popular on book talk.

I'm not attacking this woman at all. I'm just showing her as an example of kind of the thinking that I think a lot of Christian women have when it comes to books. And her mind might continue to change. Like I said, she's a, I think that she said that she's a newer Christian too. And certainly my mind changed and perspective changed on the things that we consume and all of that the longer that I was a Christian. But that's just representative of how a lot of Christian women think about consuming this kind of content.

And here's another Christian book talker saying, yeah, I think that we should read it. If you've been around a while, you know that I have read all of Sarah J. Mass's books as a Christian. And I have talked in depth about what things I think might bother you as a Christian and what things bothered me or didn't bother me. And if it's something that I would read, Aktar is no exception to that. I would read the Aktar series. I have read the Aktar series. Just like a lot of people on here, these books are what got me back into reading. And I absolutely, absolutely loved them.

Okay. So that is a different perspective. Basically, like, look, I like them. Okay, I like them. I'm a Christian woman, but I like them. And I'm going to read them. Now, we've kind of already covered why I don't think either option is good for the Christian. Just skip the spice, only read the first three books, or you know what, it's just entertainment.

and it's culture and we're just going to, we're just going to read it because we like it. Because no matter where you fall on that spectrum of acceptance or participation, again, these books are designed so that you will get sucked in. Like you will want to keep going and it's going to be really hard to skip those pages. And even the implication of the things that are happening, I do think has an effect on our mind. And again, it's not just the sex. It's not just the pornographic material. It's not just the vulgarity in the fifth book.

It is also just the idea that this is what a healthy relationship really looks like, that the alternative to this Reese person, this fictional character, is abusive. That if your husband or your boyfriend doesn't reach his level, something's wrong with him. Something's wrong with you. Something's wrong with love. Something's wrong with the world. That creates discontentment. especially if you are a single woman and you are rightly wanting to be married one day.

But I can actually say especially, I would say it's just as harmful if you are a married woman. But because really either way, it's just creating these unrealistic expectations that can cause dissatisfaction and discontentment in you. Discontentment will lead to resentment. Will lead to bitterness. Will lead to you starting to think, huh, maybe I really, maybe this isn't worth it. Like maybe I really should be out of this. Maybe I should be looking for something more.

Maybe I do deserve sunshine. And you know what? We've had a really hard couple years and this is not what I want. If that's your mentality, you're going to end up lonely. And that's not how the Bible describes marriage. The Bible doesn't describe marriage as two perfect people coming together and having a perfect romance forever and ever. Romance is good.

And you should feel strongly for your spouse. You should fall in love and be attracted and all of those things. those are beautiful, but they are made beautiful and deeper by the difficulty that you go through together, by working through conflict. That is the intimacy that is privileged during marriage that you don't have with any other person. It is the tying together of every part of your lives that is really hard because you're two sinners, but also sanctifies you as an individual Christian and also sanctifies your marriage. That's holy. That's good. What you are you, you're seeing in these books is, again, frictionless life, frictionless relationships.

They do not exist in the world. And as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another, well, you need friction for iron to sharpen iron. And if you are seeking romance or life or a job or anything that doesn't take that kind of sharpening, then you are going to end up being a very dull person. So let's get into the biblical perspective on this. First, first, First, like, why are women, particularly Christian women? Why are they seeking out these books, knowing that there is some pornography and some of them, vulgarity, unrealistic expectation, certainly not a biblical worldview at the very least. Well, I think the first is that Akatar fulfills a desire to escape from ordinary life, which can be difficult. It can have friction.

It can be inconvenient, uncomfortable, discouraging. It can be lonely. It can be boring. Maybe you don't like yourself. Maybe you don't like the people in your life. You don't like the station that you're in. It's a form of escapism. Fara is just a normal girl in this book. It's taken to this extraordinary world where there are these idyllic male characters that are fighting over her. She gets one hot guy who mistreats her. She gets another hot guy who saves her, okay, just like Bella and Twilight. Escaping from life, though, this is the answer to that. Escaping from life does not bring lasting joy. I think there is something innate in us that does tell like something's not right here. Something feels broken in this world. Things are not how they're

supposed to be. And for some reason, I'm longing for something to reconcile all of it. I'm longing for wrong to be made right. That is a good desire. But that is satisfied in Jesus. That is satisfied in the future hope and glory and rest that we find in him. You are right. Things are not right. Sometimes life is boring. Sometimes life is hard. Sometimes you are lonely. Sometimes you are lonely. Sometimes there are things about yourself that you don't like. Sometimes marriage and your relationships are hard. The reconciliation and the redemption, the resolution to all of those things is found in Christ and our hope of heaven. It will not be found in these fantasy novels. Jesus tells his disciples in Matthew 16, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me for whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life from my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gained the whole. world, but forfeits his soul, or what shall a man give in return for his soul? So it is not worth gaining the temporary pleasure, which really is so temporary because you can see from the people who read it, they love it when they read it, and then they're left super sad because their life

isn't like that. Your soul, your purity, your mind, your relationships are not worth the temporary pleasure that you are getting from these books. The second thing is that I think that we like to see women or women like to see women as warriors with magical powers who embody fictionalized feminine strength while also needing saving by a hot guy. Okay. Again, best of both worlds. Fyra is a strong independent woman who don't need no man and she needs a man to tell her

that, okay? And she needs a man to save her and make sure that she knows that. the truth is that there is such thing as strength that is unique to women. We see that and characters throughout the Bible that were included by the men who wrote through the power of the Holy Spirit, the Bible. We always hear that the Bible is so patriarchal and impressive of women. And it was just written by a bunch of patriarchal men who just wanted power and all of that. Okay, well, then why was Rahab included?

Like, why do we read about Deborah? Why do we read about Mary? Why do we read about Martha? Why do we read about Lois? Why do we read about all of these incredible women who contributed to God's plan of redemption by his will and contributed to the advancement of the gospel in the New Testament?

I mean, really, like, why would we have such an account of Mary who had this incredible special privilege that is only unique to women to be able to bear the life of our Emmanuel? How incredible is that? So there is such thing as, feminine strength. Again, I would tell you if you're looking for it, go to scripture. Go to the fact that God made us in his image male and female and that we are innately worthy and valuable because of that. Really, what we see in these books in so many books is that, like, this character's value,

it comes from her own self-discovery. It comes from her own self-fulfillment. It even comes from her ability to attract hot guys, you know, like these fictional immortal characters. The feminine strength that we have as women comes from the Lord, it comes from being image bears, it comes from the incredible power that we have to be able to nurture and nourish life. That is actually so much more trustworthy and more grounded than what we see in these fictional characters. When you think about the book of Esther, and I don't have to read this entire passage, but in Astor 4, she has kind of her famous speech as she's talking to her uncle Mordecai

about her plan to help rescue the Jews. She said, I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish. If you want stories of real courage about women who derived their power, not from themselves, not from any man, but from the Lord, then read the Bible.

Mary, of course, as we said, the mother of Jesus has been an archetype of humility and devotion and strength, obedience to the Lord when it would have been really hard. Luke 138 and Mary said, behold, I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word and the angel departed from her. So just incredible courage, incredible bravery by the woman that the Lord has ordained throughout history.

The third reason is really not that deep. I think that their readers, Christian or not, they like the sexual content. Like, I think they like the romantic content, the idea that there are faded mates, where two lovers are destined to be together. They're similar to soulmates. You're imprinting on the person. There's a soul tie, which Taylor Swift talks about in one of her songs.

But for several reasons, neither Akatar nor any other romance novel can provide the wisdom and guidance that women actually need for a healthy pursuit of love. Because you're looking at a counterfeit of biblical love. and of covenant to love. Real love is built through ordinary yet spirit-filled faithfulness between a man and a woman who choose commitment and sacrifice and purity, sex within marriage and only within marriage, which is the only sexual union in God's eyes. We see that in Song of Solomon, how this romance and attraction and the sex between husband and wife is beautiful. It's a gift. You know, when people say that, you know, Christianity is boring, that we

demonize, you know, physical pleasure. No, that's not true. We just believe that anything is enjoyed properly only within its context, its proper context. When something is used wrongly, well, then it's not used well. It ends up being broken. Literally think of any object that you, if I tried to use the printer as an air fryer, it's not going to work. It's not going to work. It's the same thing with sex. It's the same thing with love. It works. best within the proper context, and the God who is love, 1 John 4, 8, created marriage in Genesis 1. He says that the proper channel of love is between one man and one woman in the context of marriage. And that's not just where it's most protective.

That's where it's most fruitful. That's where it's most beautiful. That's where it's most enjoyable because it's safest there. It's most loving there. Your most known there. This concept of soulmates or faded mates is not found. in the Bible. That doesn't mean that I think that you should just settle for someone who says that they're a

Christian. As I've said many times, I think you should love the person. I think you should want to be around them. I think you should be attracted to them. I think that there should be, especially at the beginning, like, oh, my goodness. Like, I'm just, I cannot wait to be with this person tomorrow. I can't go one second without seeing this person. Like, there is part of that that is really fun, but that is actually not the foundation

of marriage. What is the foundation of marriage is a very serious and solemn covenant. In Matthew 19, when Jesus is answering a question from the Pharisees about divorce, he says, what, therefore God is joined together, let not man separate. A man and a woman coming together in marriage have been joined together by God. It was the more powerful force and the lesser force of man should not separate that union. That's how important it is. And God gives two clear reasons for divorce, adulterate.

abandonment. And so it's not, hey, you deserve sunshine. Hey, your husband should be more like Reese. Matthew 19, 9, and I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for sexual immorality and marries another commits adultery. That's very serious. First Corinthians 715, but if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases, the brother or sister is not enslaved.

God has called you to peace. We could go on and on about that. We've actually talked about that before in a previous episode. like what the Bible really says about divorce and the reasons for divorce. But we can see, since we read the Bible asking, okay, what pleases God most, what glorifies God most, we can see that actually God's heart is marriage. God's heart is reconciliation. Again, not that a woman should stay in an abuse of marriage.

That's not at all what I'm arguing. But God's desire is commitment. And he is not expecting your commitment to be dependent upon the, perfection of your spouse. So what I would say to Christian women is that I understand very much as someone who loves to read and loves fiction why these books are attractive and why it's so easy to just say, well, who cares? They're popular.

I can skip over that stuff. That stuff doesn't affect me. You're a human. It does affect you. Of course it affects you. It affects all of us. That's not a defect. That is just a part of being a human being with a brain.

things are supposed to affect us. That's exactly why we read in Philippians 4. Hey, think about lovely things. Think about the excellent things. Think about the things that are only worthy of praise. And that doesn't mean that we don't talk about difficult stuff. We talk about difficult stuff on this podcast. And there is a balance in knowing what's going on in the world,

understanding that suffering exists, that hard things exist, that injustice exists. And we are called to be agents of justice and clarity. and courage and all of those things. Think about the abolitionists. They certainly had to think about some things that were not lovely when they looked at the oppression of the slaves that then gave them the courage to use the gospel to abolish slavery.

We think about things like abortion that are so awful. We have to know what that stuff is in order to have the moral fortitude to fight against it. But what we dwell on, even when we're thinking about evil things that exist in the world, what we are dwelling on is God's good opposition to those things. We are dwelling on God's holiness and his hatred of evil.

We are dwelling on the contrast between God's light, his righteousness, and the evil of this world that Christians are also called to oppose. We cannot be. I'm speaking to myself, too, as someone who not only loves to read, but I also love TV shows. I also love movies. I love culture.

I, you know, I love engaging in these things. We have to be so careful not to be... consistently entertained by the things that Jesus died for, entertained by the things that he calls sin. So when we are dwelling on what is good, right, and true, we have to think about what we're consuming, what we are entertained by, what we are paying money to consume.

And I would say that these books don't fall into the category of the things that Christians should be dwelling on. All right. Now we've got a short conversation with my friend Kosti Hinn, who will be at a speaker, or he will be at Share the Arrow's as a speaker, and he has a background in the prosperity gospel. His uncle is Benny Hen,

one of the most prominent prosperity gospel, health and wealth preachers in the world for decades. And of course, Kosti has believed the gospel and repented of all of that. It is incredible pastor, evangelist, apologist, an author, and he's going to be talking about Catherine Crick and some of the,

just her popular, and the reaction to her in just a second. Let me tell you about our next sponsor first, and that is crowd health. You've probably seen how the health insurance industry, like, it just makes things hard. It can make you feel sicker than you already are at a time when you don't need to feel worse. That's why, chief or later, bro, and I have opted out of it altogether, and we use crowd health. They put care back in health care with a community-focused, low-cost alternative.

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Join crowdhealth.com, code alley. Crowdhealth is not insurance. Opt out, take your power back. This is how we win. Join crowdhout.com code alley. Costi, thanks so much for taking the time to join us. I've been wanting to talk to you about this Catherine Crick phenomenon. She has been going viral all over social media.

This woman who claims to have been an ordained apostle can heal people, can exercise demons, just from being in someone's mere. presence at Barnes and Noble. Now, I've gotten a lot of pushback, as you have so often over the years, for saying, you know what, this doesn't actually seem biblical. The response seems to be from people, well, she's doing these amazing things. How can you deny it? So how should we think about someone like this who clearly has gained a ton of popularity from what she's doing? Yeah, for starters, I'm never worried about somebody trying to do the Lord's work or good missions work. or people who want to share the gospel, and maybe we have some differences, like if you have a Baptist and a

Pentecostal, we might believe some different things about spiritual gifts, but we both believe the same gospel, and we sort of both know where the biblical boundary lines are on some of these things. And so usually what people jump on right away is, well, you know, they're just doing nice things. You're being a legalist and a Pharisee and all these things. It's like, no, actually, when you look at the biblical framework, We're not having a debate over speaking in tongues or some difference on Baptist and Pentecostal theology. We're talking about somebody who calls themselves a literal apostle. Right when I hear that word, my spiritual radar goes up. I want to do as First John tells us, I want to test the spirits.

And so I'm going to think, okay, you're calling yourself an apostle. This is a very high and lofty position in the body of Christ. And then I want to do biblical, critical thinking. this is what I want people to do. Don't just fire off in the comment section and go, oh, you're just hating on people who are doing the Lord's work. Slow down. What does the Bible say about an apostle? Well, they've been an eyewitness to Jesus Christ. They have been given the ability to do signs and wonders, and they were established and confirmed in the early church. And then you look at the Bible and you see no affirmation that there'll be more apostles

coming or to look for new apostles, you only see warnings about false apostles. And Paul the apostle does that with the Corinthians because they were getting very showy and very full of themselves and self-righteous and prideful over the use of spiritual gifts. And this is exactly what happens. You get the Catherine Cricks, you get the Bill Johnson, who's the apostle of Bethel, you get the lead prophet of Chris Vallaton and all of these different people, and it's around the world, not just in the U.S., who have this position. They call themselves an apostle or a prophet, it. You got to go to Scripture. And what Paul says to the Corinthians is there are going to be these false apostles and deceitful workers. He does this in 2 Corinthians chapter 11. And he says they're going

to disguise themselves as workers of righteousness and no wonder because the devil disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is going to look good. It's not going to look evil. It's going to be easy for someone to get sucked in if they don't have discernment and say, oh, Ali Beth, you're such a Pharisee. Oh, Kosti, calm down. This woman is doing beautiful, looking how wonderful she is. And she's so sweet, must love the Lord. You need to slow down and think biblically. Ephesians 220 says that the apostles were the foundation of the church. So we don't have new apostles.

I still have apostles. Their names are Peter, James, John, and the rest. And they're foundational. Ephesians 220 then goes on to expand that Christ is the cornerstone. So this is all very easy to understand. And we as a people now, the church, are being built up as a whole. Holy Temple on top of that. So you don't go back and jack up the foundation and redo it when Christ has built it. It's perfect. The apostles were and are established. They gave us the

scriptures. And I have a deep concern with self-appointed apostles today. They are deceivers. They are not obeying scripture. And if you look at the evidence, they are playing a game that has long been played throughout the ages. This is nothing new. It just has long brunette hair and expensive outfits. That's it. Okay, quick pause to tell you about our last sponsor for the day, it's a really important one. And this is pre-born. This is a network of clinics that is saving lives every day. They're ministering to moms and dads. They're helping these babies in need. They're helping these moms choose life by giving them the resources and the truth that they need to make the best decision. more than 80% of abortion vulnerable women choose life after seeing an ultrasound at a pre-born

network clinic. So when you are sponsoring a free ultrasound session, you are saving a life. If you donate just $140 that helps rescue five babies, $28 provides one life-saving ultrasound. So whatever you can do, whatever you can contribute, it helps save a life. Go to preborn.com slash alley, make your donation today. That's preborn.com slash alley. When you point out that the interactions that Crick has with so many of these people, a lot of them are women at the Barnes & Noble, these women who say, you know, I need help exercising this demon from my child. She'll say things like, okay, well, you need to sow a seed of, you need to sow a seed of faith.

It's because you haven't given enough money. You haven't done enough. You haven't prayed hard enough. You haven't sacrificed enough. or this is partial deliverance and you see them flailing on the ground when someone like you or like me or any of the other people who have said, you know, that just doesn't seem to be what we saw with exorcism in scripture. Her defenders will pull out like a verse or they'll be like, well, well, actually, if you look at this verse, it does say this. Or if you look at

this verse, it does say this. And something I've seen over and over again is, okay, by criticizing Crick in these instances, you're committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. I've gotten several messages saying you're committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit for calling this out. So break that down for us because that's very serious. No Christian wants to think, oh my gosh, am I really speaking against the Holy Spirit by saying, I don't think this lines up with Scripture? Yeah. Fires me up, a few things. I've recently preached. I'm going through the Gospel of Matthew at our church. And I just preached that text not more than several weeks back. The blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is so clear as the outright and ultimate rejection of the Spirit's conviction concerning Christ and to reject Jesus Christ.

The Pharisees committed that sin because they looked at Christ and said, you are doing the work of the devil. Meanwhile, he was bringing them the kingdom and clearly preaching the gospel with evidence. and they were rejecting him. And so what is the ultimate blasphemy of the Holy Spirit? Why is it the unforgivable sin or the unpardonable sin? It's because they were rejecting Christ with a hard heart all the way through until their dying day. There's no coming back from that.

There's only one unforgivable sin. It is to reject Jesus Christ because then you go to hell. You cannot be forgiven. And you are now damned. That you're condemned. That's why Romans 8 says there's now no condemnation for those who are in Christ. otherwise you're condemned. So it's not the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit to use discernment and to say that person's a false teacher or casting out demons or doing what you're doing at Barnes and Nobles is not evidence of the Spirit's work.

People say, oh, how dare you? Well, actually, I'm in line with my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ because in Matthew 7, he warns that many people one day in verses 22 and 23 are going to say, Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord, I did this, this, this. and one of those is I casted out demons in your name. And Jesus says to them, depart from me, I never knew you. Literally, we never had related. You knew me. I don't know you. You workers of lawlessness.

What is that? That's outside of the bounds of what God has called you to do and commanded you to do. And so when you're outside of scripture and you're leveraging the Bible for manipulation, deceit, or what Peter says, if you just read the letters, of 2 Peter, and you just lay it out really clear that 1 Peter is great too, but if you just want to understand what Peter's getting at across the whole, he says that in their greed, they will exploit you with false words, and they have a sensuality about them, and they have a smoothness. So you're not committing the work of blaspheming the Holy Spirit when you call out the truth,

also casting out demons or praying for people who are demonized or demon possessed is not evidence that you're some apostle and i just wrote a book it's coming out i haven't told anyone this it's kind of a secret so now it's out but in the new year it'll come out in the new year it's literally called not today satan and it's how to over how to kill sin and win at spiritual war because that phrase people have used i wanted to write a book that gives you a real biblical understanding of spiritual warfare because we have people who have no theology of warfare and they get sucked into this and then others who are like, well, what do I do then with the demonic and with these things? And I wanted to give people kind of a roadmap for that.

Catherine Crick is playing on the ignorance, the naivety, but also the desperation alley. You remember the people coming to Jesus and they would plead and to the apostles and their children and friends were tormented by demons. never once are you going to be told give a gift. Jesus doesn't say, yeah, pay for my hotel, my suite this weekend in Galilee. You only see that from false teachers. And you remember the apostles? When the man is crying out, crying out.

They say, silver and gold have I none. He wants money. He's crying out. Ams for the poor here. Silver and gold have I none. But that which I have give I thee, in the name of Jesus Christ, rise and walk. And we used to sing this song as kids. I don't know if anybody watching will remember this,

but we used to sing this song in Kids Church, and it would be that miracle, in the name of Jesus Christ, of Nazareth, rise up and walk. And then we would sing this part after. And he was walking and leaping and praising God, walking and leaping and praising God. And we would sing, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.

And as a kid, it was ingrained in my mind, ironically, as I grew up in the prosperity gospel, that these guys couldn't give them money, they weren't going to give them money, there was no transaction involved, but man, you're going to have Christ heal you through his apostles and it's free. And that's a model of the gospel. The gospel is free. You don't need to pay to make God do something. You don't need to pay for demonic deliverance. Deliverance comes through conversion and the work of the spirit. When he moves in, all the demons get evicted. That's what the Bible teaches. You don't

have to pay for it. You surrender to Christ. The gospel is free. Deliverance is free. And that's my main concern with Catherine Crick. People want to talk about spiritual gifts and get all into the other debates. No problem. I love my Pentecostal friends. She is a false teacher, and I have dear beloved Pentecostal friends who are calling that out too. And that tells you something. We're unified on what is darkness, and it's not the light. Totally. Totally. Koste, thank you so much. Such good insight. And your book, when does it come out? I think Zonderen has it slated for like January 19th, There's something like that. It's the new year.

Yeah. Okay, cool. Okay, cool. We'll have to have you back on to talk about that at some point, but so excited about that. All of your books contain so much good practical biblical wisdom. Kasi, thank you. See you on October 10th in Dallas, Texas for Share the Arrows. We're so excited to have you.

Can't wait. See you soon, Allie.