Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 211 | The Dangers of the New Age | Guest: Doreen Virtue

Episode Date: February 10, 2020

Doreen Virtue, former New Age guru and author of "Deceived No More,” joins Allie to discuss the dangerous nature of the New Age and the surprising places it can show up in our lives, such as in yoga, essential oils, and self-help books.

Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. I am so excited about this conversation today with Doreen Virtue. We are going to talk about the new age. She was completely in the new age, teaching the new age, practicing the new age and then became a Christian and her life is completely changed. And she is going to lend us so much insight about this self-empowerment movement that is extremely. popular today and a lot of the ways that it's manifesting itself. And it's probably going to surprise you a little bit. It might even offend some of us just a little bit, but that's okay. I think that all of us are going to gain tremendous insight for Doreen. So from Doreen, so without further ado, here she is. Doreen, thank you so much for joining me. I'm really thrilled to be with you and everyone, Allie. Well, you tell us a little bit about who. who you are and what you do. Absolutely.

My main role these days is to warn people about new age methods and practices and beliefs that are so prevalent in our world today and unfortunately have crept into our church. I was raised in a heretical church called Christian Science, which is actually neither Christian nor scientific. I didn't know I was in a false church. No one told me. it wasn't until after I got out that people said, oh yeah, by the way, you were in a false church.

But what happened was it led me into the New Age because the New Age is very similar to Arianism and a lot of the heresies that still are prevalent today. And I became a New Age teacher, is the bottom line. I actually became the top-selling New Age author at Hay House, which is a huge New Age publisher that had Wayne Dyer, Marion Williamson, Louise Hay, Deepak Chopra. I used to travel with all of them for about 25 years around the world,

giving New Age workshops. I was on Oprah, CNN, The View. And I didn't know anything was wrong. You know, I would hear sometimes Christians criticize me, but I didn't get it. It wasn't until Jesus opened my eyes, and I finally read the whole Bible that I understood that I was sinning terribly. And then when I committed my life to Jesus and got baptized and joined a church, that's when I was shocked to see that the New Age was there too in the churches. Wow.

So before we get into what the New Age is, because I do want to make sure that we define that for the audience who may not know. Can you tell me a little bit about Christian science? Because I'm familiar a little bit in a very superficial sense, but what is Christian science and why does it kind of? lend itself to the new age? Well, when you think of Joel Osteen, you think of Word of Faith, you think of name it and claim it, right? You think of speak the magical words and you'll have wealth. Well, Christian science is the health counterpart to that.

Speak the magical words and you'll have health. The whole thing is about manifesting health. Christian science believes it takes scripture such as we're made in the image and likeness of God and twists it to say that, therefore, No such thing as illness could occur in this world. No such thing as injury or accident. It's an illusion. So in that way, it's like narcissism.

It's denying the material world, the human body, and everything's spirit. And including having a very heretical view of Jesus as, and I can barely say it now, that he's just a man. When my mother's still a Christian scientist and she's moved in with my husband and I, when she hears us say that Jesus is God, she'll run out of the person. the rim, literally. Wow. That's heresy to Christian science. It was a religion channeled by a woman, Mary Baker Eddy, so similar to some of the other

false religions that were channeled by one individual. And like I said, I thought I was Christian. My mom said you were a Christian. We had a King James version. Only Bible in our house. We would read every week. We'd go to church twice a week, Sundays and Wednesday testimonial meetings. We used Christian terminology.

I had no reason to doubt that I was a Christian. And like I said, no one told me. So that's why I'm out there kind of upsetting people and offending people by pointing out that things aren't Christian when the world says it is. Ellen DeGeneres, I heard in an interview was raised Christian science as well. And now that you're explaining it, it's kind of jogging my memory about the interview that she did, I think with David Letterman, not going to the doctor, like you said, not. taking any medicine. And I do see how that correlates to this new age. One word that you said

that I hear so much, even in the church is manifest. Pick a word and manifest it. Speak it into being. Would you say that that's kind of how you got into the new age and started touring with people like Marianne Williamson, that idea of manifesting what you speak? Absolutely. In fact, I was very ambitious and I learned later the danger of ambition because the devil will swoop right in there and he's a sugar daddy, he'll give you your wishes, and you become an indentured servant to him. And that's what happened to me.

I got all my wishes. I was manifesting. I even had books and tapes, and, you know, back when we had tapes and CDs and workshops on manifesting. And the thing is, it worked, Allie. It absolutely worked. That's where I think that some of the hyper-charismatic teachers

are hooking their audience in because some of this does work. But the thing is, it's like a desert mirage. So you'll get your wishes for just a minute. You'll never have satiation or satisfaction with them. There's always that desire for more, more, more, more. In fact, you'll see some of the hyper-charismatic so-called profits. Say more, give me more, Lord, give me more, Lord. That's the heart of the new age is manifesting to get your life purpose,

your soulmate, more money, more. more abundance, they call it, to soften because of money sounds crass. And so this ambitiousness is fueled by this belief that we do it ourselves. The word God to a New Ageer is akin to the universe, a universal energy, not a personal God that we know, that has love, justice, and mercy. I didn't know God. And so I turned to angels because they seemed more accessible. and I became known as the angel lady who wrote about angels, taught about angels, as another means of manifesting.

I saw them as wish-granters, tragically. Because I hadn't read the whole Bible. I had just read, you know, the Luke, the enunciation. And I didn't really understand the biblical view of angels until after I read the whole Bible. And, of course, I've repented deep sorrow to God for teaching what I told. taught and then doing lots of videos and blogs and articles and interviews to tell people that nowhere in the Bible does it say that we as humans go to angels and ask for wishes. Nowhere in the Bible does it say we call on angels to get a parking place or to get anything.

God sends angels. And the Bible also says in 2 Corinthians 1114 that Satan will manifest, will him masquerade as an angel of light. And so we have to be super careful when we're dealing with angels because a lot of it is demons in disguise. Can you tell us how you transitioned into making the new age a career? It just happened. Again, I was very ambitious. Right outside of college, I got a BA and MA in psychology.

And I became a psychotherapist specializing in treating addictions in hospitals and eating disorders outpatient and I started writing about my practice and my book did very well. I went on quite a few talk shows as that. So I was already out in the public arena as a psychotherapist. And then I just, it just kind of morphed into the new age. Psychology and motivational speaking, inspirational speaking and new age is a very blurred continuum. And it just went more and more in that direction. I'm really looking back and looking at other people Allie, I think that deception

is progressive. Like how a progressive disease gets worse and worse. There's this tolerance that you get to your experiences. It's like if someone works in a donut bakery, they don't smell donuts after a while.

Or even in our own house, we don't see the artwork or the sofa anymore. We habituate to it. And with New Age manifesting the self-glory, which is a big heart of the New Age, where we glorify ourselves instead of God, you start to get bored with where you're at and you want more, you want a deeper experience. There are so many people that I've talked to who started with wanting to be healed.

So they entered the New Age thinking they could get a healing of some sorts, mostly physical, sometimes emotional, or that they could find their soulmate this way or have a personality task, you know, some sort of curiosity, the devil holds out this little carrot. And then years later, they wake up and they've become wikins or witches because they followed that breadcrumb trail of more and more intense and adrenaline-filled experiences. The New Age is all about experience, which is what reminds me of the hyper-charismatic churches. Yes. So I know a little bit, about the origins of the New Age. Now, it's always manifested itself.

If we recognize that it originates with Satan, of course, it's always manifest itself at some point and some way throughout history. But when you read about the history of psychology and really self-introspective psychology of Carl Young, or is that how you pronounce his last name, kind of bringing the popularity of personality tests and the Ineagram and all of that to the United States, Would you say that that's kind of how it came to the West and started to become so popular here?

Or can you pinpoint when this became the trend that it is today? Well, when I look at the Old Testament, I see the New Age in the Old Testament. And one word, idolatry. Romans 1 just captured it. We traded the creator for the creation. And so the golden calf is a symbol of a new age to me. It's that not trusting that Moses will come back down off the mountain, not trusting that God will help you. So I'd better do it myself.

Yeah, I totally agree with you. And I've never thought about it that way of it being in the Old Testament. How do you see some of what I would say is innocuous, or they feel like it's innocuous, some of these motivational speakers and even people claiming to be Christian authors, focusing on self-empowerment, focusing on self-help and self-love and self-esteem as the answer to all of our problems. I mean, I think of people like Renee Brown, people like Rachel Hollis, that I do think probably have really good intentions, but are all focused on the self. Would you say that is under the umbrella of the new age that you're familiar with? Definitely. In fact, that's one of the biggest arguments that I pose to people who try to say that they can blend

the New Age with Christianity. They think there's nothing wrong with it. They're polar opposites. And it starts with that very premise that you just mentioned, is that one Christian is glorifying God, all glory to God. And New Age, motivational speaking, inspiration is all about glorifying the self. Look, a lot of the New Ages that I met over the 25 years that I was touring around the world were very broken.

They were traumatized. They'd come from abusing. families, they'd been abandoned, they'd had alcoholism and drug addiction issues, they were divorced multiple times. And so they were looking for something to feel good about themselves. And the New Age seems to offer that, along with the New Age type of Christianity that is all about affirming, I'm perfect, I'm whole, and complete. That's a real buzz phrase in the New Age. I'm perfect, whole, and complete, I'm made in the image of likeness of God. And everybody's a child of God according to the New Age. Right, right. We hear that a lot. And not just from people who

purport to be in the New Age, but I mean, and I would say most people who are in the New Age do not purport to be in the New Age at all. Like you said, they claim to be Christians and articulating scripture. And I think what I've seen is that a lot of these people who are trying to wed the New Age with Christianity, they use a verse like, well, Jesus says to love your neighbor as yourself. So that means that before I can do anything else, I need to love myself and I need to empower myself and help myself and heal myself and care for myself and all of these things. And then that's when I can maybe start thinking about obediently, you know, following Jesus.

But that's a lie, isn't it? It totally is. Yeah. Loving the self, it actually is never in the Bible. Right. To love yourself. Jesus's royal commandments, people forget the part where he said on the, on these two commandments, hang all the prophecy in the law.

They forget that part of the sentence. And so what that means is that when we look at the moral laws, the Ten Commandments, they can be summarized with loving God and loving other people. And so it doesn't discount those moral laws. We're still on the hook, even if we're not believers. And so it means we need to, first of all, take a look at the first commandment, that you shall have no other gods before God with the capital G. So that means no idolatry.

Commandment, too. No idolatry. And when you love yourself, you're idolizing yourself, you're putting yourself as a God before our creator. And a lot of people respond to that by saying, you know, taking it to the other extreme by saying, so you're saying I'm supposed to hate myself. You're saying that I'm never supposed to sleep or rest or get my nails in. And of course, that's not what we're saying. That is not what the Bible says. The opposite of self-love is not self-deprecation and self-loathing, which is really just the other.

side of the self-obsessive coin because still you're idolizing yourself in the midst of self-deprecation and self-loathing and constantly thinking about yourself self-victimization and things like that. The opposite of that is self-forgetfulness and self-sacrifice and self-denial. That is what Jesus calls us to, correct? That's right. Yeah, absolutely. Self-deprecating behavior and talking often is an attention-seeking behavior. You're wanting people's sympathy.

You're wanting attention. And so again, that's wanting yourself to get the glory. And we just have to be honest. I mean, what happens is when we're saved, we hate sin. And we grieve over sin. That was the big turning point for me. When I finally realized I was a sinner was when I could be saved. Before then, I was bulletproof to being saved.

And that's my concern in people going into false churches that have new age elements or being in the New Age, is that both of those type of thinking, of belief systems say that we're perfect. God made us perfect. And in fact, in the New Age, and there's a book in the New Age that's referred to as the New Age Bible called A Course in Miracles. That's what Mary William Williamson got famous for. That's what she went on Oprah for, originally that launched her career,

this book, A Course of Miracles, that supposedly is channeled by a woman named Helen Shookman, who was a psychotherapist who heard a voice that said it was Jesus explaining what he meant in the Bible. And the New Ages just lap this book up. I mean, everyone reads it. And that book says that there's no such thing as sin. There's no such thing as the devil except for the human ego,

and that there was no crucifixion. And so what happens is that how can you be saved unless you know that you need a savior? If you follow the new age, you'll be convinced that you're your own savior. And that's dangerous. Right. And now that you say that, I realize that that really is the lie that is underneath all progressive, so to speak, liberal theology and liberal Christianity is this problem with the idea of sin. It's this idea in the new age and also I would argue in liberal theology that who you are in the inside, is actually perfect, except for if you just have to throw out all of these societal standards,

you just have to throw out expectations, you just have to throw out condemnation, judgment. If you get rid of all of these things and you just live your true, authentic self, that's really what Jesus wants you to do. Jesus just wants you to be who you want to be, be happy according to your definition of happiness. That's what Christianity is really all about. That's New Age Christianity. It aligns very closely with liberal theology, but that's not what the Bible says. The Bible says in Ephesians 2 that we are dead in the trespasses and sins of which we once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power

of the air. And according to the Bible, there are two categories. You are alive in Christ or you are dead in your sin. And it seems like the new age completely discards that dichotomy that is biblical, even New Age Christianity and says, no, no, no, no. Who you truly are is good. You're good to the core and you are worthy and you are deserving of all of God's love. Like you said, already a child of God. You don't have to do anything, believe anything. Everything is all fine and dandy and good. And that's obviously, as we both know, a dangerous lie. Yeah, exactly. The New Age says tolerance is love. And that if you have any intolerance, such as the Bible, has, that that's hate. And so that's the danger that we're going to see

in the years coming up and that I see politically is if there's a liberal majority taking over it, you know, they're going to point to the Bible as being intolerant so therefore hateful and unloving. It's going to be called

hate speech. So that's what Jesus is all about. When I was in the New Age, I thought that I was following Jesus. It turned out I was following the false Christ that Jesus warned about in the latter days. And the false Jesus says, I love everything, I love everyone, and kind of does this swoop on what you said on the greatest commandment to love people and says that if you love people, then anything they do is fine. You know, so just accept them as they are, which is actually

the most unloving thing we can do when we understand the biblical truth, because that's leading them through hell through the wide path. The narrow gate is a gate of realizing that we're sinners. And when I realized that, it was actually such a relief to realize that I needed God and who God was, and I needed Jesus to save me and steer my life that when I looked back on my life, that I had done a horrible job of being my own God. And so I quit. God, take over the will, please. And it was scary because I was super successful in the new age. I was making a ton of money, spending a ton of money, because I had employees. I had friends who I would take on first-class vacations everywhere.

I had this big ranch filled with animals as feeding them and taxes galore that I was paying. And I had to walk away from all that in complete trust that God would help me without me doing my old schick of manifesting to make money. And then these job offers kept coming in saying, well, here, you can work for me. You can work for me. And it was all painted with a new age, though. So I had to keep saying no to these job offers. My husband went back to work to help pay for us. We had to move.

We lived in Hawaii. We moved to the Pacific Northwest, which now I like it. But in the beginning, it felt like punishment to go to the snow from Hawaii. And so the beautiful thing that happened was I was just talking about. the truth, the biblical truth on social media. And I was getting so much backlash. I still do. But in the beginning, it was horrible.

It was all of these so-called people of the Love and Light New Age hating on me, making these rude videos about me, making up stories about me, writing cuss-filled letters. I mean, it was just horrible persecution. But in the midst of that, Thomas Nelson Publishers wrote me and said, we like your story, we want you to write a book. And so it just showed, trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding,

and he'll make straight your path. And, you know, Proverbs 3, 5 through 6, just that God's promises are true. And so I'm so glad I didn't cave to saying yes to some of these job offers I got that were tainted with the new age. And then when I was writing this book, I thought, can I really tell the whole truth? because Thomas Nelson publishes some of these authors that I don't agree with.

And so God and His Providence gave me an editor at Thomas Nelson, excuse me, gave me an editor at Thomas Nelson who has a very conservative background. And she gets it. And so I was able to just completely speak the truth with discernment. I'm sorry. That's okay. I was able to completely speak the truth with discernment in my book, deceive no more. It comes out in July.

And so praise the Lord. Yeah, I'm able to talk about these things. I mean, it's been at a price. I've got a couple of family members who won't speak to me at all anymore, which is so hurtful because they say I'm not a real Christian or I would love everyone with tolerance. Yeah. So, I mean, this is real indebted. I walk through Walmart or Target and I can see New Age slogans on kids' t-shirts and everywhere on boxes of Kleenex. I mean, the New Age motto is believe in yourself. Mm-hmm. It never says believe in God.

Right. Okay, I want to back up just a little bit. And if you could explain how you came to Christ, what made you realize, wow, okay, I thought I was a Christian this whole time. And this is not Christianity. Yeah, it was a slow process. You know, thinking I was a Christian my whole life, I've listened to Christian radio my whole life. That's the irony. When I lived in California, I used to listen to Chuck Smith, Calvary Chapel guys.

When I was in Hawaii, I was listening to Christian Satellite Network. And because the New Age told me I wasn't a sinner, the gospel made no sense to me. What do you mean Jesus died for my sins? What sin? I mean, why did he have to die? It made no sense. Everything else I love. But in January of 2015, I'm driving down a highway.

in Hawaii, listening to Christian Satellite Network, Alistair Begg comes on, and they start to cry. And I just pray, I get a chance to tell him this someday. But he had an expository sermon about itching ears, and it was all about false prophecy. And as listening to him, it pierced my heart, Allie. Wow. He got through to me.

And I was convicted that I was a false prophet, and that I was itching people's ears and giving them false hope. And I listened to that and it changed everything for me. I wasn't saved, but I went home and I told my husband, you know, I need to make some changes. I want to go to church. My husband was raised Methodist. He was baptized at age 12.

But he was lukewarm, maybe not even saved. He was in the new age with me. And so we started to go to church. I pulled back on consciously giving people false hope. Because in the new age, you always say, oh, the worst is behind you. Everything's going to turn out fine. Of course God's going to heal your cancer. I mean, you say things like that in the new age, and you believe it.

In fact, you won't allow yourself to have disbelief in the new age because the new age is all about positive thinking. In fact, if there's a ten commandments for the new age, number one commandment would, thou shalt always be positive. So you don't allow yourself to think about sin or poverty or disease. You kind of live in this fantasy bubble world that God's going to rescue you at the last minute. And then people wonder why they're suffering. They think God has abandoned them if they're suffering. They don't realize that God allows some suffering so that we will bend toward him. And so we went to church and kind of was we were doing church shopping.

We had no idea where to go. We tried. Methodist church wasn't anywhere around us. So we went to a Pentecostal church, which was wild. we ended up in an Episcopalian church for two years, which was, I always say it was a soft landing place out of the New Age. I don't think I, now I'm a Baptist. I couldn't have gone straight into a Baptist church out of the New Age. It would have been a culture shock. Yeah. Chris Rosebo said it was my halfway house to go to an Episcopalian.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm so glad I'm glad you didn't stop there. Not that all Episcopalians, I'm sure, are like the church that you attended. I'm getting. guessing the church that you attended wasn't necessarily biblically based. I'm sure there are people that identify as Episcopalians who do believe that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, but Episcopalian churches tend to be more liberal theologically. Just a note to my audience who may not know. Yes, it was extremely liberal. The Bible study classes that Michael and I attended, the teacher, who was an Episcopalian priest and a Catholic priest, said that the Bible was still. with errors and he would argue that a lot of the books of the Bible shouldn't have been in it.

You know, so there was a few people in the class who would pull me aside and say, don't listen to that part. And they would quote Second Timothy 316. All scriptures God breathed to me. So it got me used to doing a few things at the Episcopalian Church. It got me used to going to church every Sunday again, and it got me used to going to Bible study. And still, I was unsaved. I would go to church and I would go home and use throw cards.

So I didn't know. There was people in the church who were doing Reiki, energy healing and yoga. There was a yoga studio on the church campus. And then my priest sent me to a spiritual director who said, I didn't need to change anything to be a Christian. She said I could still do cards. I could use crystals for healing. I mean, she told me I was fine.

So I was very confused in the beginning. And I was doing weekly YouTube videos. My YouTube videos were super popular, 180,000 views minimum per week on my YouTube videos. My Facebook page, 4 million viewers or followers. I'm not saying this to brag. I'm just saying that I had a lot of eyes on me. And I'm real transparent person. So I'm talking about all this to everyone.

I'm saying, oh, yes, I'm going to church and here's the Bible. and people who were Christians said, I don't think she's saved. She's still doing cards. She's still talking like a new ageer. And they thought I was thinking that to be a Christian. The truth was I was a weak Christian. I didn't know any better.

And that's what I see a lot of that's going on right now is people don't know the difference between New Age and Christianity. So that's why people like you and me and, you know, there's quite a few of us discernment ministers. Justin Peters are out there. Who else? Todd Friel talking about, and Chris Roseboro fighting for the faith, the discernment ministers were the ones who really helped me to see. But the moment I got saved, I remember it, was when I was reading the Bible.

I got the one-year Bible. My son actually gave this to me as a gift. And this is how I first read the Bible. You can see it's dog-eared. I've read this three times. And now I read the ESV every morning. and I'm in seminary. But when I got to Deuteronomy 18,

verses 10 through 12, and this is Moses' last speech to the Israelites before they're going to cross the Jordan River. Moses is not going to go with them because he's sin, and he's recounting the moral laws and expanding on each of them.

In other words, he's taking the Ten Commandments, and he's breaking them down and explaining them to the Israelites. And in this section, Deuteronomy 18, Moses is explaining to them, you can't be like the Canaanites. You can't be like the people who are in the promised land that I am commanding you to drive out. And those Canaanites, they are sacrificing their children.

They're burning their children. And I don't want you to do that. And I also don't want you to use divination like they do. I don't want you to do fortune-telling like they do. I don't want you to do witchcraft. I don't want you to do sorcery. I don't want you to find signs and omens. I don't want you to do mediumship.

And so Deuteronomy 1810 through 12 is this list of what the new age is about. I didn't, of course, burn my children like that. But all the other things in that list, I did. And then the end of that passage, Allie, it says, all of these things, I find the people abominations who do this, not the practices, the people who do fortune-telling, the people who do sorcery, the people who do witch. The people who do divination, interpret signs and omens, do mediumship, receiving or giving mediumship.

Those people are abominations to me. That split my world into, because before then, and a lot of New Ages think the same way, this is an important point. I thought that I was doing God's work because I thought I was making people happy. I would do mediumship sessions where I would help people to get over their grieving with a deceased loved one. I would take cards and read their future, and people would be happy. The thing was they were accurate readings because demons will feed messages to false prophets like I was and to psychics and mediums. And so I thought the accuracy was a sign that it was from God, and the fact that people were happy was a sign from God. I would say a lot when I was on stages.

I was giving keynote workshops to thousands of people around the world, and I would say the following words that now embarrasses. me to know, and I would say I'm God's secretary. Wow. Because I was channeling books. You know, I'd listen for a voice and I'd write what I'd say. I'd hear. And I had written over 70 books and 38 languages worldwide. I mean, this was huge what I was doing, a huge blasphemy, huge heresy.

But at the time, oh, go ahead. Well, at the time, I really thought I was doing God's work. A lot of New Ages will tell you that, that they're doing God's work. and that Christians are not doing God's work because it makes people unhappy. This is their litmus theft. And so when I saw in Deeron and 18 that what I was doing made me an abomination to God, it broke my heart. I was on my knees crying and weeping maybe three days of begging God to forgive me

and just saying, I didn't know God, I didn't know, over and over. I'm so sorry I didn't know. And then the more I read the Bible, I saw that hell is real in the news. Age, it's considered to be a metaphor that you have hell or heaven on Earth. And in the New Age, it's universalist that the belief is everyone goes to heaven. All paths lead to God. So it's pluralistic, relativistic, and universalistic. So you can do no wrong in the New Age, is the bottom line. When I read that I had done grievous wrong, that's what I was saved. You said something very interesting earlier and then just now that I think a lot of us,

a lot of people tend to do as well. They see what they think is fruit of someone's ministry. So, wow, they've got a lot of followers. They've, you know, they're getting a lot of people to church. Look, they're, they've got a lot of people praying. They've got a lot of people believing. They've got a lot of people raising their hands or rejoicing. So what they're doing must be fine.

Maybe God is really using that new age pastor or I see this a lot on the prosperity side. So when I said liberal theologically earlier, that doesn't necessarily mean liberal politically. There are a lot of people on the conservative political side who buy in to people like Joel Osteen and other kinds of these prosperity pastors that are very new age in the sense of what you said, that you're really a good person. God just wants you to know you're a good person. you just need to manifest your word for this year, manifest your prosperity, manifest your health, and all of these things. And so they look at their churches and they're saying, wow, they've got

tens of thousands of people there. They've got to be doing something right. Or, you know, people are hearing the name of God that God loves them for the first time. So it must be fine. Who are we, who are we to judge? So I think that that's a really important point, that we can't just look at someone's follower count or the number of people in their congregation and say, well, you know, it must be, it must be fine. With that kind of logic, I mean, when Jesus says, like, the gate is wide, that enters into hell and the gate is narrow that, that leads to heaven. With that logic, then the way to hell must be right, too, because a lot of people are going that way. So that doesn't make too much sense. Yeah, absolutely. I did New Age expos. They were called Mind, Body, Spirit

festivals. They were called I Can Do It. They recall these expos were we'd be on stage in front of thousands of people, and I was the only one using Christian terminology. And so people still today said, I thought you were always Christian Doreen, because I would start my workshops with the prayer to God and Holy Spirit and Jesus. And I would also add Archangel Michael because I thought that he was, it's a blasphemy. It was praying to angels. But so I was using Christian terminology as were some of the other teachers, There's a woman who channels this entity group supposedly called Abraham, and she's got a book called Ask and It Shall Be Given,

which is just twisting Jesus' promise. So people were confused. When I would finish my workshops at the end of the night and I would be doing a book signing, there would be this line of people waiting for me to sign their books and say hi and usually tell me their stories. So many of them wore cross-examines. around their neck or crucifixes because a lot of them were Catholic.

I realize now that a lot of them were lukewarm Christians that had not read the Bible. A lot of them would brag this term. They would say, I'm a recovering Catholic, and they had left the Catholic Church because they said it made them feel guilty and bad about themselves. And they went running into the arms of the New Age, which said, no, no, no, you're a good person. God loves you. Right. Can you touch a little bit on yoga crystals, these things that are very popular? I only, I'll just admit, I only very recently, very recently started thinking about yoga in this way. I just never thought about it. I just thought, you know, some people are using it as a spiritual practice. I would never use it as a spiritual practice. But, you know, it's working for me. It relaxes me, whatever. And then. I started getting some messages from followers saying, you know, you probably should look into yoga because I think I maybe said a couple times on social media.

Oh, yeah, I just did yoga, whatever. And I started looking into it and I thought, well, maybe this is me using part of the new age. And I didn't realize it was harmful. So what is your take on that? Oh, big take on it. I did yoga for 20 years. It's part of being in the new age. The new age appropriates multiple cultures.

So it takes a lot from Hinduism, Buddhism, Native American spirituality, and kind of blends it together without really knowing what it's doing. So it's spiritually dangerous because people will pray to these Hindu deities that I think the average Hindu would be afraid to deal with. There's some scary deities in Hinduism. So yoga, which means yoked, and it means yoke to Brahman, the idea in Hinduism of the creator. So you're yoked to the Hindu creator doing yoga. There's a series that's in virtually every yoga class called the Sun Salutations. And it includes these poses, Chaturanga, Warrior 1 and 2, Downward Dog, Upward Dog, Sun Salutations. And each of those poses is designed to bow down to a different Hindu deity.

It's whole meaning. And this is not coming from Christians. criticizing yoga, that's part of yoga theology. And so people will argue with me all the time, oh, well, I would never, ever bow down to a Hindu deity. I'm saying scripture, I'm listening to Christian radio while I'm doing yoga. It doesn't work that way. If it's rooted in paganism, it doesn't matter whether we slap the veneer of Christianity on top of it.

It's gone. Yoga has no place in any Christian's life. And I'm particularly concerned that it's being offered to children in churches because children, this is what happened to me. I was so vulnerable. I trusted my mom who said, oh, yeah, we're Christians. This is a Christian church. And hello, mom. No, we weren't.

Yeah. And so kids just don't have any kind of discernment to know that yoga is going to lead them in the wrong direction. If you're bowing down to Hindu deities, which are demons, you're going to be. attracting those demons. Now, people will say, but isn't it okay to stretch? Of course it's okay to stretch. We're supposed to stretch. It's how our bodies are made.

But that's a big difference from doing a warrior pose or a Chaturanga or a downward dog. There's ways to stretch. You get on your floor with a towel and you just move your body. That's stretching. You do that. But don't go to any holy yoga classes. Don't go to anything like that.

that people in those classes get so mad at me for saying this. But I have to speak the truth because no one told me. I wish that someone would have told me what you and I say these days, Alie. I, so let me articulate what my thoughts were when I was in a place of, I guess, just justifying it. Now, I've never been big into yoga. It's not something that I just didn't really like, but I did use to teach bar classes and yoga wasn't part of bar. And again, I just never, never thought about it. So, but when I, when people started sending me stuff and saying, you know, maybe you shouldn't talk about doing yoga.

When I was, when I was pregnant, I was like, oh, yoga's really the only thing I can do it. So I talk about it on Instagram and people would start saying things and how I thought about it. And I just want to kind of hear what you would say to someone who is thinking this right now, listening. Okay, but what's the difference in me doing a lunge with my arms outstretched, not calling it a warrior one or warrior too. I don't even know what it's called. What's the difference in just moving my body, not thinking anything spiritually about it all, and okay, now I'm moving my body in the exact same way pretty much, but I'm calling it a yoga term. What's really the difference in that? Aren't we

just being legalistic? Oh, I understand that all the time. I'm very much accused of being a legalist, but the definition of legalism is that you are saved by your work. We're saved by grace. We're free in grace. But the thing is when we're saved, we want to obey God. And so we want to glorify God in everything we do. Is it glorifying God to do poses that were designed to bow down to pagan deities, going back again to Deuteronomy 18? Even Acts 1919 or Acts 1616 for those who say, oh, the Old Testament we unhitch from. We're not glorifying God when we do yoga poses. The Warrior 1 and Warrior 2 poses are not natural. They require a lot of static movement to lock your arms in place to make them completely outstretched. People would not do that naturally or arrive at that on their own doing stretching. There's a big difference doing a lunge, no problem. I mean, that's no problem. Moving your arms around, no problem. But locking them to either side, you are mimicking a Hindu deity and it's dangerous. Interesting. Well, I'm very thankful for the people who pointed it out to me. And I know that

there are people listening to this who might be feeling defensive. And like I just want to say I totally understand. Like I just admitted, this has been a very recent development in my mind. And I probably was a little bit defensive when people pointed it out to me. But I'm so thankful for the grace and the patience of God and the Holy Spirit moving in our hearts through other people. And even though at first like our idolatry and our sinfulness wants to kind of, you know, push that kind of rebuke away or push that kind of correction away, I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful for the Holy Spirit and how he relentlessly pushes us towards holiness, even when our first reaction is defensiveness. And I'm sure that's the reaction that you get to a lot of the stuff that you say. Absolutely. The first time I

put a video warning about yoga up on YouTube, it was the first time that I got an equal number of dislikes and likes. People either hated it or loved it. But I do think, you know, of course, God uses everything for his good, for his glory. And so the fact that you didn't feel conviction about it at first and your defensive is a wonderful story to help people who can identify with that. So praise God. Praise God, definitely. Okay, we only have a little bit of time, but I want you to touch on a couple of things as we

wrap up. Can you talk to me about crystals? I've gotten a lot of people saying, you know, God, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, one time said something sarcastic about, oh, the same people who make fun of us for believing in the Bible is the inerrant word of God or the same people that say, oh, I'm going to rub a crystal on my forehead and all my problems are going to go away. Well, I got a backlash from people who identify as Christian saying, well, God made these crystals to have the power that they do. What's your opinion? Or what's our thought? Well, God definitely made crystals. The Bible, especially

the Old Testament with the high priest had crystals. Crystal references, gemstone references from Genesis to Revelation. And so that's not the problem. It's how we use them. People use them in an idolatrous way. Anytime we elevate something that's having power above God, so we say this crystal has the power to heal or to divine my future, go read Romans 1.

That's idolatry, putting the creation above the creator. So that's where we get into trouble. So I always ask people asking about crystals to be very honest with themselves and with the Holy Spirit and say, what's the purpose of me having this crystal? Is it a decoration? Is it to glorify God like having a bouquet of flowers, beautiful creation from God? Or is it because I think it will give me magical powers or it will help me in some way? And if you're thinking it's that way, get rid of it.

Get rid of all the idols that you can find. Same with essential oils. I was going to bring that up. I was like, oh, this is dangerous territory, but I don't want to talk about that. Okay. So essential oils, same litmus test, is it an idol or not? A lot of these essential oil companies have these magical sounding blends that they've made that promise. Kind of under the radar. This will give you happiness. This will give you, you know, this or that promise. And so that's when it becomes idolatrous is thinking that the oils have a magical property. granted there's oils all throughout the scripture. You don't need to send me the scripture. I'm very aware of where it says oil in the scripture.

But again, going back to Romans 1, are you worshiping the creation or are you worshiping the creator? Are you glorifying the creation or the creator? It's a matter of being super honest with yourself and with the Holy Spirit. Right. And just to let people know they're listening to this, I have essential oils. I, you know, use eucalyptus, you know, in the shower. I like how it smells and I believe that these things have good properties in them that we can use.

But I think that what you said Doreen is so important, that there is a litmus test to these things and that we have to test ourselves, that we have to ask God to look into our hearts to see if there be any grievous way in us. Are we idolizing whether it be crystals or energies or whatever it is that we think is going to heal us or to change our lives or to bring us. us peace. God is the giver of peace, not an essential oil. That doesn't mean that lavender isn't calming. But it does mean that, like you said, Doreen, it doesn't have the power that God does. So it's not inherently sinful to have a crystal that's beautiful or something. Well, I don't keep crystals because I was an idolaturer with crystals. I can't have them. I'm like an alcoholic who can't have any beer in the house. But I use essential oils for cleaning. I I totally agree with you. I've got a big thing of eucalyptus in my shower. I use lavender because

there is scientific proof that it does help to calm you down. But I don't give it more power than that. I don't say, oh, please, lavender, please calm me or anything like I would at the new age. Right, right. Okay, one more thing. Something that I see that is, that seems to be growing more and more prevalent. You mentioned children doing yoga. Well, it doesn't seem like it's just yoga. Like there is a book that a lot of Christians were concerned about that is being sold. And I think Target teaching kids about demons, there seems to be also not just among children, but among women, especially an affinity for witchcraft just outright. And a lot of symbols of occult. Some people are saying, I haven't looked into it quite enough, but some people are saying there were satanic symbols, even in the halftime show,

but there does seem to be playing with fire, pun intended, when it comes to the occult and those kind of symbols. Is that something that you've noticed? Absolutely. Again, this is the progressive nature of deception. When I first started with Hayhouse, my New Age publisher, we were not even allowed as authors to use the word psychic. When I left them 25 years later, their number one selling books were all about witchcraft. So they had gone from zero to 60. And I see that with a lot of people. They want more.

They want more. They want a sense of power and control in their world. And witchcraft seems to offer that, that you can cast spells, and you can get your soulmate, you can get your job promotion, you can get health, wealth. And so the danger is that witchcraft will also say, oh, well, this is nature. This is an alternative to big, bad Christianity is the way it's marketed. And it's women empowerment. When I first was saved, the number one complaint I got from the New Ages who used to follow me

is that Christianity is so patriarchal because New Age is mostly women followers. And so witchcraft seems to be something like a women's spirituality that Christianity, that the Men of Christianity have pushed away because they don't want the secret to be revealed. So realize that underpinning, if you have a left one, is in witchcraft. It's that there's that sense of a jealous rivalry between Christianity and witchcraft. And there's not. It's Christianity being concerned about people going to hell is the bottom line. And witchcraft, if you go into a bookstore these days, you'll see witchcraft books everywhere, including for children.

Disney's new show is all about. glorifying witches. When I was a kid, Disney shows made witches the demons, the villains, right? The Snow White Cinderella, the witches were all the demons and the villains. Nowadays, the witches are the heroes in a lot of Disney shows. And we can't know that as parents unless we're monitoring what our kids are doing and comparing it to scripture. It all comes back to biblical literacy, doesn't it? Knowing the Bible so that you can compare everything to what God's word says. Yes, and I have so many thoughts with what you just said. One, that women have an affinity towards the New Age more than men do,

which goes to show that Satan is giving the same lie to women that he gave Eve in the Garden of Eden, trying to convince women that you really have the power of God in you, and if you just do this thing, if you just follow me, you will be like God. You will have all the power that God has, and that's what is being sold to them, not just in overtly, in the overtly witchcraft realm, but in all of this new age. And something that I want people to realize and people will say, oh, you're just exaggerating, you're taking it way too far, you're being judgmental, is that even if someone is preaching to you about self-empowerment and self-healing and self-love and self-care, no, they're not

overtly saying that they're a witcher, that they might not engage in what they believe is witchcraft, but it is all intertwined because the underpinning in all of this is that the God is self and that you have the power over yourself, you have the power to manifest all of these things in your life. There is not that much of a difference between some of these motivational speakers and outright witchcraft. Again, it's different labels, but it is the same kind of deception. Wouldn't you say or do you think I'm taking it too far? No, no, no. Actually, it's so clear. If someone would just read Deuteronomy 18, 10 through 12, they can see how God puts it all on the same level playing field of sacrificing your children and doing fortune-telling, which can include horoscopes and astrology. And I'm going to just to offend everyone even more, Enneagram is one of the things that people should take a look at.

It's popularized by Richard Rohr, who's got pantheistic and universalistic belief. And it's not from a Christian monk. This has been completely exposed that that was a marketing scheme that they came up with, make it seem palatable to Christians. It's a new age personality test. I have a BA and MA in psychology from Chapman University, one of the leading universities, and I studied personality tests a lot in college. I can tell you the Enneagram is not in the same category as like an MMPI or the Stanford-Bene,

which are scientifically created personality tests. And besides that, Christians shouldn't be all obsessed with who am I by going to a personality test. Am I an eight? Am I a one? That's self-idolatry. That's self-glary. Who we are is in the Bible. That's where we find those answers.

Right. And it all goes back to, as you have said multiple times, it all goes back to Romans 1, or that's one of the places that it goes back to in Scripture. You've cited quite a few places where we can see the reflection of, today's deception in the Bible which shows that, you know, Satan might be crafty, but he's not original. He's not creative. He's not really coming up with new temptations. It's the same temptation all manifesting itself in a different way. But it does reflect so much of what we read in Romans 1 that not only are we engaging in these new age practices and these occultist practices that really make ourselves God, but we see what happens when we make ourselves God. And there are

two things that we've talked about on this podcast that I see a lot is the elevation of animals to the same place or above humans and the degradation of babies. And so you have child sacrifice and you have this animal worship. And wherever there is animal worship in the Bible, there is also child sacrifice. So again, all of these things just go hand in hand. Absolutely. It comes down to knowing your Bible and praying for God to reveal what's in your heart to you. It's really praying repentance daily and praying Psalm 139, you know, show me God what's offending you. And having the courage to do that. It's scary when you feel bad about yourself, when you've gone through a lot in your life and you don't feel lovable. It's really scary to ask God, what am I doing that's

offending you, God? But it's necessary. Yes. And it's so much, it's so much better. Because like you said, the self-love, self-empowerment, self-worship stuff, it feels good for a little bit. And it might make your life better in the short term because maybe you do have some confidence and you're able to achieve a goal. Maybe you're able to lose weight. Maybe you got that promotion. Maybe you ended up taking job opportunities that made you more money and you're fulfilling your dreams. And so you look at your life and you say, well, God must be blessing what I'm doing. That book must have been right.

But in the long term, not only does it eternally lead somewhere that none of us want to go, but also it doesn't truly satisfy because you're always looking for the next thing that you're supposed to do. Okay, so I lost the weight. Well, now maybe I, you know, whatever it is that you need to do to manifest the next goal in your life. And so you're constantly craving. Like you said, people saying more, more, more and more. But Jesus calls himself the bread of life. He is the well that never runs dry because in him we find rest for our souls.

We find satisfaction. Our hunger is finally cessation. our thirst is finally satiated and his yoke is easy and his burden is light whereas in yoga like you said we're yoked to a false god whose uh whose yoke is difficult and his burden is heavy jesus the one true god offers us something uh much much better amen yeah so well well i hope that everyone has ears to hear what you just said because that's the bottom line well there's so much more that I want to talk to you about, man, I will just have to have you back. I would love to have you back when you're around the time that your book is coming out because I know it's going to be so

important for people to read. I just finished writing a book myself that comes out in May, and I know the process is grueling. So congratulations to you for getting this done. If you could tell everyone some information about where they can find you. If you want more information about your book, just feel free to tell everyone anything you'd like. Absolutely. Well, I'm pretty easy to get a hold of. You can write me on Instagram direct message. My Instagram name is... And yes, that's my real name.

I have a YouTube channel during Virtue for Jesus with a lot of discernment videos. And, Allie, I would love to interview you when your book comes out for my YouTube channel. And also Facebook page during virtue for Jesus. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking the time. This was a fascinating conversation.

probably the most, one of the most, if not the most important interviews that I've done. And I'm so excited for people to listen to this. We're probably going to get a lot of pushback, which you and I are both used to. And that's okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. And we'll be in touch soon. Okay.

God bless you. Thank you. You too.