The Confessionals - 682: Re-Enchanting The Unseen

Episode Date: August 27, 2024

In episode 682: Re-Enchanting The Unseen, Josh Robinson shares his extraordinary experiences as a pastor in West Virginia, detailing an encounter with the supernatural that changed his worldview forever. Josh explains how a young woman, involved in deep witchcraft and invoking ancient deities, came to his church seeking redemption. Her eventual baptism became a powerful, unsettling experience, culminating in what many witnesses, including Josh, believed to be an exorcism.Josh talks about how this event sparked his deeper exploration of the unseen, ultimately leading him to write a book called "Re-Enchanting the Unseen". He uncovers ancient lore, the mysterious supernatural history of West Virginia, and his upcoming podcast, "Tell Me Strange Things", which will explore local legends such as the Mothman, ancient giants, and the connections between Appalachia and mythical realms like Atlantis.Josh RobinsonPodcast: Tell Me Strange ThingsBook: Re-Enchanting the UnseenMEET TONY AT:9/4 - 9/7 - PhenomeCon: https://linktr.ee/merkelmediaSasquatch and The Missing Man: merkelfilms.comMerkel Media Apparel: merkmerch.comThe Confessionals Members App:Apple Store: https://apple.co/3UxhPrhGoogle Play: https://bit.ly/43mk8kZBecome a member for AD FREE listening and EXTRA shows: theconfessionalspodcast.com/joinAFFILIATESGo Silent with SLNT Faraday Bags: https://alnk.to/clXuRY5EMP Shield: empshield.com Coupon Code: "tony" for $50 off every item you purchase!SPONSORSSIMPLISAFE TODAY: simplisafe.com/confessionalsCONNECT WITH USWebsite: www.theconfessionalspodcast.comEmail: [e-mail] to the Newsletter: https://www.theconfessionalspodcast.com/the-newsletterMAILING ADDRESS:Merkel Media257 N. Calderwood St., #301Alcoa, TN 37701SOCIAL MEDIASubscribe to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/2TlREaIReddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/theconfessionals/Discord: https://discord.gg/KDn4D2uw7hShow Instagram: theconfessionalspodcastTony's Instagram: tonymerkelofficialFacebook: www.facebook.com/TheConfessionalsPodcasTwitter: @TConfessionalsTony's Twitter: @tony_merkelProduced by: @jack_theproducerOUTRO MUSICJoel Thomas - Walking In My SkinYouTube | Apple | Spotify

Hey guys, before we get to this week's show, I want to let you know, we are going to Phenomicon 2024 in Vernal, Utah. This will take place on September 4th through the 7th. They asked me to speak there and they're giving me 90 minutes to go crazy on stage with you guys. So I had to take advantage of it. I hope to see you guys there in Vernal, Utah on September 4th through the 7th. Get your tickets now. Link in the description below will take you right to their page where you can purchase the tickets and get your spot secured for Phenomicon 2024. Merkel. Media.

This was all circulating around the base that a giant had to kill, but no one was supposed to talk about it. He jump underneath the door, curl up to grab it, and then disappear. He came over to me. Dude, he slithered over to me. A giant comes out of the cave and they're all frozen. And he starts running and firing at this giant. With a giant moves, he's got a spear in one hand, and he's running really fast. and spears, Dan, holds them up like this.

Somebody else, shoot them in the face, shoot them in the face. They basically decapitated. Something pulling at my leg. And I look over and there are two small, getting pulled off the best, push, and I touch you. Because I know I'm seeing a monster. Welcome to the show, everybody. You're listening to The Confessionals podcast. I'm your host Tony Merkel.

Thanks for being here. If you have a crazy wild experience, you want to share with me on the show, go ahead and shoot me an email. My email address is contact at the Confessionals podcast. com. That's contact at the confessionalspodcast.com. Or go to the website, theconfessionalspodcast. com. Hit the contact section and you can reach you that way as well. Either way it works for me. Just get a hold of me. If you want more shows on a weekly basis, we got you covered. Theconfessionalspodcast.com slash join or just hit the join button on YouTube. Both are membership platforms and both offer the same membership content no matter where you're at. So go

ahead and check out if you're interested. Also go ahead and check out Merkmerch.com. That's Merkmerch.com. media apparel needs. We launched our brand, I'd say about six months ago, and it has been going fantastic. So go ahead and check it out if you haven't done so yet. And also check out at merplefilms.com for all your on-demand streaming needs. Our latest documentary, Sasquatch and Missing Man, is the rave of the town, and you want to check that out. Now, friends, I'm out here on a lake hunting lake monsters. We were called out here on an emergency, and we're going to wrangle ourselves some kind of lake monster today. It's right below us, but I had to do an intro for you. So here we are. Today we have Josh Robinson on the show and Josh is the author of Re-enchanting

the Unseen. He is also a brand new podcaster on Mercal Media. You can check out his podcast, Tell Me Strange Things, live right now. So go ahead and hit subscribe, give it a five-star rating review and listen till your heart's content. Now Josh comes on the show today and we talk about giants, angels, demons, the unseen realm and all things like that. I know you're going to enjoy this conversation. So let's get to it so I can get back to wrangling Lake Monsters. All right, today we got Josh Robinson on the show. How are you, sir? Sir, I am good. And it's good to speak with you again. Man, I've been doing this for a long time. And I always say, I got so-and-so on the show. And today, I fumbled it there just now because I was going to say a podcast. I'm like, what are you doing?

It's show. Like, it's just the little things that get me going, man. Listen, dude, you, you're somebody who I think this is the first time we've actually talked to each other face to face like this. We've talked back and forth on the phone quite a few times over the years. You used to have a podcast and that podcast kind of died off for a while. You're coming back out with another show. And you wrote a book called Reenchanting the Unseen. So if you could, before we get into conversation and things like that, introduce yourself to the audience. Let them know who you are.

Where can they find your work and stuff? because I think after today's interview, they're going to want to check you out even more. Yeah, man. I appreciate that. And like I said, it's good to talk again. Awesome to be able to do it face-to-face this time. Well, it's face-to-face, I guess, as we can be. But in West Virginia and, you know, in the bunker wherever you're at.

We're down here, Tennessee. I wasn't going to say that. But yeah, yeah. So my name is Josh Robinson. I'm a pastor. I planted a church coming in on a day. decade ago now, called New Haven Church. We're actually in the heart of the coal fields in West Virginia. And so, you know, that's a little bit about me, a husband, father. And the reason why I'm

here is because, you know, it's whenever you become a pastor and you're ministering to people, right? It's inevitable that at some point in your ministry, you will come across something supernatural that will rock your world. And for me, that is exactly what happened. And funny enough, that event was actually recorded in a docu-series called Dark Haller, which is actually on YouTube. You can find it there for free. It has hundreds of thousands of views now at this point. I've not kept up with it in a few years. But I get people all the time who come up to me and ask me about it. And I still get people who call me.

Like, people find my email address and my phone number out there. And I get voice messages all the time. But basically, long story short, that docuseries is about a young female who ended up in our church at that time. It was back in 2020, you know, whenever the world fell apart with COVID and all that stuff, who ended up at our church and she was possessed by a demon. Now, I had never encountered anything like that up until that point in my life. And to be honest with you, at that point in my life, I was even a little skeptical of that kind of thing. Just because, you know, whenever you look out in the world, you see a lot of craziness out there, right, with this kind of stuff.

So, but we had a legitimate event that happened here at our church that kind of rocked my world and rocked the world of our church and even somewhat the surrounding area that we're in. So, but if you're interested in that, you can go and you can find that. It's on YouTube. But after that, I kind of got into podcasting. And now I'm actually starting up a podcast with one of my co-pastors, his name was Travis Turner. and that podcast is called Tell Me Strange Things. And basically what we're going to be doing that in that podcast is, you know, kicking around some of this kind of stuff. Make from a bit more of a pastoral perspective, because I'm a pastor, he's a pastor.

I'll tell you right now, I'm not the guy who goes out in the field, you know, and does the Ghostbuster stuff. I'm not that kind of guy. But from time to time in my ministry, those two worlds overlap, right? And so in that podcast, we're going to be talking about that a little bit. And particularly in this first season of the show, we're going to be diving into the supernatural history, mythology, whatever you want to call it, of West Virginia. Because as you know, West Virginia is not just wild and wonderful. It's also weird and wonderful. Right.

Like we've got things like the Mothman. We've got the Flatwoods Monster. We've got ancient oceans trapped under the mountains from the time of Pangia, if you believe in that kind of thing. There are a lot of strange things. We have mounds where giants have supposedly been found in them.

We have ancient ruins built on mountaintops that are like miles and miles long and they have no idea how they got there. We have all kinds of strange stuff. So in this podcast, in the first season, of it. We're going to be diving into that part of West Virginia and talking about the strange thing here. We have Ogham, weird strange ogam petroglyphs on rocks that are highly debated. So yeah, so it should be a whole lot of fun. So we're going to be talking about that kind of stuff. And then later on, as we roll out new seasons, we'll dive into other places and some of the

weirdness in those places and talk about that. But since we're both born and bred West Virginians, it just felt right to talk about the strangeness of this place that we call home. So that's a little bit about me. Ah, well, dude, I love it. And the podcast sounds amazing. So it's right up my alley. You're talking about ancient oceans under the mountains. I'm like, what? Like, it's just, to me, that's fascinating stuff. And I think people are going to love it. I know you're talking about doing it in season. So, you know, people can definitely go over there and check that out. And as the time we record this, you haven't released episode one yet. By the time this airs, you should have, at least on at least one episode.

So people can go ahead check it out. Tell Me Strange Things Podcast on Apple, Spotify, wherever you get your podcast, and leave a happy five-star rating and review. And I do emphasize happy. Yes. Thank you. I appreciate it. It's so funny to me.

We've released episode zero, which is just a teaser, which is already well over a thousand listens. So we've not even released an episode yet. And we've already got two and three-star review. So it's amazing. Hater's going to hate, but that's cool. We're going to keep doing what we do. But man, I'm fascinated by the ocean stuff, and we actually talk about that a little bit in episode one.

Like I said, we've already recorded some of this because we're planning on releasing in seasons. But, but yeah, one of the fascinating things about West Virginia, and you guys will hear this in episode one, is at one point, apparently the Appalachian Mountains, which also run down through where you're at, Tony. I see them every day. I'd turn out of my driveway and they're right in front of me. Yes. So apparently, at one point in their history, this mountain range that is here was also a part whenever the continents were together and we didn't have this continental drift, right? Apparently, they were connected with the Scottish highlands and those run up through, you know, the bottom part of Ireland into Scotland. And then also it was connected to the Atlas Mountains as well.

That's in Africa. and for those who don't know, the Atlas Mountains are actually named after the Greek Titan, Atlas, so a giant. And that's actually where the Atlantic Ocean gets its name, and where Atlantis got its name as well. It's right there where the Strait of Gibraltar's at, where Plato said that Atlantis was at.

So West Virginia has a weird history going back a long, long time. And it's even connected to things like ferries in places, and Atlantis is strange as that sounds. So it's going to be fun. Yeah, it's going to be fun. I'm looking at the Atlas Mountains now, and I'm just thinking, yeah, okay, Pantia, if you smush everything together, yep, they're pretty much the same mountain range. That's pretty wild. And it's funny.

A lot of these places have really similar, like lore and legends. So if you go to Virginia, there's actually a place called, oh gosh, what is it? It's like Ferry State Park. I can't remember what it's called. I can't remember. I'd have to look it up. But it's this place just down in Virginia. just so it's just a it's like a couple hours away from me here in West Virginia.

And there, there's like history and lore of fairies. And there's these things called fairy stones there. And there are these stones that are like smooth and they're in various cross shapes. Right. And so the lore is is that the fairies, you know, they used to, you know, frolic in this, this beautiful place in the mountains. You know, again, this was connected to Ireland and Scotland at one point. So it's weird that that lore carries over here.

Appalachia. But apparently there was this elven messenger who came and told the fairies of Christ's death. And they weeped. And whatever they weeped, the stones turned into crosses. And so just, you can see like this amazing connection between these places and the lore and just even the story of Christ. It's, it's really amazing stuff. So it's going to be a lot of fun to talk about it more in depth in this season for the show. Yeah, absolutely. And the ancient ruins that, that's often talked about with these mountains. I'm still on the hunt for these ancient ruins. I desperately want to find a location to explore that has these ancient ruins. I know there's some spots in Kentucky. I've been told in the last year that from somebody that comes from within government ABC agencies,

that when he left to come here, because he's no longer there, he was told by one of his co-workers that in this area of like the Knoxville area of Tennessee in the mountains, there's somewhere around here a pyramid that is in the mountains. And I'm like, well, I got to find that. You know, so like when I'm driving around and stuff and I see some of these mountain tops and I'm like, well, that looks like a pyramid. That looks like a pyramid. Like maybe we have lots of pyramids or maybe there's just hills that look like pyramids.

You know, I don't know. But I find that stuff fascinating. So one of them that we're going to talk about in this season and it fits in with what you're talking about. Um, there's, it's called the Mount Carbon stone walls. So it's about an hour and a half from where I'm at here. And I actually drove by it here not too long ago. But it's, uh, literally on top of this mountain called Mount Carbon in Fayette County. So it's kind of, you know, got the, it's named after this Fayette guy, but there's also that

fae, fairy connection to it too. Um, but it's fascinating. So on top of this mountain, there, um, there is the stone walls and they're six and seven feet high. and like they go for miles on top of this mountain. And they can't figure out why they're there. And the fascinating thing is at the foot of this mountain, there are people buried at the foot of the mountain. And, you know, European settlers found these whenever they came here.

And they're all buried facing towards the east, right? Which is where, you know, the sun rises, right? The sun rises in the east and it sets in the west. So they're like facing the rising sun. And just this lingering mystery. And nobody knows who they are, how they got here. why they're buried the way they are, what these ruins were. But yeah, that's just right down the road,

or right up the road from me. So if you ever are in West Virginia, we can we can go check them out. Book it, book it, book it, book it. I want to, I'll hit your place right after I hit Justin from Appalachian Intelligence because I still got to go find that lost city that he keeps talking about. Yeah, he's got some treasure hidden down there somewhere too that I would love to find. Yeah,

I'm going to find it. I'm going to steal it from whatever I got to do, you know? No, I'm just kidding. I won't steal it from. I just, for me, the treasure is the hunt. You know what I mean?

Like, that's the fun part for me. Like, I really don't care that much about finding the gold or the treasure as much as, like, the journey of it. That's, that's always been the most fascinating thing to me. So,

uh, anyways, sounds like a freaking awesome podcast, man. Tell me strange things. Podcast. People can go check that out. Uh,

now you're also an author. So, I mean, you're a pastor. You're a pastor. you're a police officer and now also author. And I want to get into this book and maybe the genesis of the book for you and how this kind of all came together because it's it has,

and I might be wrong in this, but just the title itself says Heiser to me. You know, reinchanting the unseen is what the book is called. And I think you probably draw a lot from Heiser, I imagine. Yeah. Yeah, so I definitely do. And it's so funny. I actually came across the work of Dr. Michael Heiser, the late Dr. Michael Heiser, may you rest in peace.

I came across his work. It's been about five years or so ago now. So at the time, I was actually taking a sabbatical in Pigeon Forge in Tennessee at a place called Wilderness at the Smokies. And just absolutely wore out, drain from a long season of ministry. and just down there and really teetering on the verge of burnout. And I took a stack of books down there to read. And the first one that I cracked open, and I just happened to buy it on a whim at the time,

was Dr. Heiser's The Unseen Realm. And I read it. And whenever I left Pigeon Forge, I was not the same person. Like, it opened my eyes to an unseen reality that I had taken for granted in some ways. And to just be quite honest, didn't quite understand and was just skeptical towards.

And I think that that's where a lot of us are at, if we're honest, especially as modern people who have been disenchanted by things like science and things like that. Right. Like a lot of us think that if I can't see it, touch it, quantify it, then it doesn't it's not real. Or if it is real, we just typically reduce it down to, well, this is a mental thing, right? Psychosomatic type of thing.

And, you know, basically the thing that I come to realize through that and then through some of my own experiences as a pastor is there is an unseen realm out there. There are things in that unseen realm and they are vying for your attention. And not only are they vying for your attention, but they are actively engaged in warfare against you, right? If you're a follower of Christ and Christ people. And you need to know about them. You need to know who they are, what they do, and what the Bible. says about them. And so that's really what this book is aimed at. It's called re-enchanting the unseen because it wants to help you view the unseen realm in a re-enchanted way. So Mike's book really kind of

lays out the supernatural plot line of the Bible. What my book does, it would be a great follow-up read to Mike's book. And so what it does is it takes the characters, right, who are a part of that unseen realm, and it really flushes out what the Bible says about them, who they are. are and kind of what their role in the cosmos are. And so that's basically how the book is structured. It's structured into various chapters and sections. It touches on the angels and the angelic hierarchy. It touches on the powers of darkness, things like demons, fallen angels, those types of things.

And then it gets into some more speculative stuff like UFOs, UAP, cryptids, ghosts, those types of things. And basically what it does is it tries to bring all of these things together and to look at them and to interpret them through the lens of the Bible so that we can start to make sense of these types of things. Because the thing that I found out when researching this book is this. These things that we experience as UFOs, UAPs, right, those types of things. These are things that have been with humanity for as long as we have ever been around. These are not new. This is not a new phenomenon. This is a phenomenon that has been with humanity for a very long time.

The only thing that has changed is the mask that they wear and present themselves with. As man grows in his technological abilities, their appearance becomes more technological. But the phenomenon that we see and recognizes UFO, UAP, that type of thing, these are the same types of phenomenon that people saw in the ancient world and would have equated with gods, angels, those types of things. things. So if you find that interesting, we'll talk about it some here, but go check out the book for the longer version of it. Yeah, I definitely want to get into this. Now, I guess my first question to you regarding this whole thing, and you kind of hit on it a little bit earlier, maybe feel free to go into it as far as a little bit more detail if you'd like to help draw this out, because I do think it's, from my perspective, and like, we're not best friends. I don't know you real well,

but from what I understand of you, this was a very new phenomenon in your life that was not really expected the whole thing that unfolds during Dark Holler. I've had word on the show, people have checked it out, but is... My basic question with this,

and I'll probably have a follow-up question here to kind of elaborate more, is what came first? Heiser or Kristen, was that her name Kristen? Yes, Kristen. So, like, was it Kristen's exorcism or was it Heiser that came first? And, you know, how does, I guess that's my question first off, is what came first here? Because I think that's an important detail to get straight timeline-wise. Yeah, it is. So Heiser came first. That was back in like 2019, 2018, somewhere in that range was about then. It was pre-pandemic. So Heiser definitely came first. And what Heiser did,

was he really opened my eyes to something that I really, I've said this on several occasions. I really think that if I had not had that first, I would have simply just looked at this girl and I would have written off everything that she was experiencing. I would have said, hey, you know, maybe you need to go see a doctor or something like that. That's just where I was. I had a disenchanted worldview. And certainly if you would have asked me, Josh, can people be possessed by demons? I would say, yeah, absolutely. But practically speaking, there was just no place for that in my theology or in my ministry.

And so Heiser came first, and then she came, and this event came, about a year later. So it wasn't something like immediately on the coattails of it. Like there was some time there, but it was about a year later on down the road. So was that something with her? she's telling you some of the things she's experiencing, was it at the river, at the baptism, where everything was kind of cemented in stone for you as far as like, yeah, something's going on here,

or were you kind of just pretty much in that camp leading up to that day? Yeah, so for me, the thing that cemented it was the baptism itself and like the profound impact that it had on everyone who was there. So like even then, like whenever so, like I had, I had only been around Christ in a handful of times at this point. It was mostly like family gatherings that this particular family had invited me to.

And at that time, I had never spoken with her. Like, I had never talked to her, never had commune, just shared space with her. And like, and at that time, if you actually ask her about that, she'll tell you, that's because at that time, I could tell you were a Christian and I didn't want to be anywhere around you. Like, she has said that kind of thing. So, you know, but basically what happened was, is there was a sequence of events leading up to this baptism. Basically, her family had been sharing the gospel with her.

Hey, you need to trust in the death burial and resurrection of Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. You need to trust in him as the king of kings, the Lord of Lords, all of that. And they got through to her. So let me say this. Leading up to this, she was a practicing witch. And not only was she a practicing witch, like, I'm not talking about witch talk, okay? Like, I'm not talking about, like, the new agey, this is, you know, whatever, is it,

Wanda Vision, you know, the cutesy kind of, you know, stuff. I'm talking about, like, she was intentionally invoking known ancient deities, demons, like Lilith in her practice, like inviting her to be embodied in her. And she was using that with a whole concoction of drugs and, rituals and all of those types of things. So I knew that coming into this. And so the fact that she was there and that she had responded and was, so basically what happened was we had church that morning. And I got a call about 6 o'clock that evening.

And so this has been four years ago now. So they said, hey, we've been sharing the gospel with Kristen and we think that she is opening to hearing you speak to her. and she may even be open to believe in being baptized. Would you come and talk to her? So I was like, sure, absolutely, no problem at all. So I pack up my stuff and I head down to Madison Park, which is, you know, which is about 15 minutes from where I live. So I get there and she's sitting at a picnic table and she's just,

you know, she's very odd acting, very distant kind of, I don't know how I'd describe it, but you could just tell something was all. So me and at this time, one of our other pastors, we walked up to her and we started having a conversation with her. I was like, hey, you know, we've been in the same spaces before, you know, that kind of thing. You know, I've been told that, you know, somebody shared the gospel with you. Is that, is that right? She's like, yeah. I'm like, so do you, would you say that you believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus?

And she's like, yeah. I'm like, okay. So, like, you would be willing to express that here publicly through baptism. She's like, yeah. So I'm like, okay, well, I don't see any reason why we wouldn't do this. So there's a whole crowd of people here. Like, it's people from our church, it's family, it's friends, because this was a big moment. Because this girl had been practicing witchcraft for the majority of her life at this point.

So the fact that she's there and she's willing to. have conversations. This was something that was not wasted. You know what I mean? So everybody's there to see this. So we start to walk down to the river. And so we get there. And so, you know, we're walking out into the river. And, you know, I think to myself, okay, I know that this girl's used drugs, things like that. I know that she's been a participant in witchcraft and not just like, you know, like low-level, you know, cutesy stuff. I'm talking about like the real deal, legit thing. If there is anybody who would be possessed by a demon, it would be this girl.

And so at this time, I had also been studying what's called baptismal liturgies. And basically just what that means is like baptismal exorcism rituals. And basically what I had found out in that, so the whole Heiser thing sent me on this whole rabbit trail. I'm like, okay, how did this get worked out practically in the life of the church? You know, and so one of the things I learned was that in every single baptism that happened in the church, that was accompanied by what was called a minor right of exorcism. And basically what that means is you basically ask God to unseat, expel anything that might be oppressing this person, and you ask them if they renounce the devil. And so, you know, I say to her, so it's me and this other man,

in the water. I say to her before we speak to the crowd, hey, do you mind if I pray this prayer over you before we start? She's like, no, that's fine. So basically, I pray this, and it's a paraphrased version because I don't have a book in front of me, right? So it's a paraphrased version of this minor right of exorcism. And as soon as I say that, she starts this low-grade convulsion in the water. Strangest thing I've ever seen. I've still yet to this day never witnessed anything quite like that.

I've certainly dealt with other people at this point who, you know, have come to me, who have experienced spiritual warfare and even people who have thought that they might even be possessed. I've still never experienced anything quite like this. So, you know, me and the guy are looking at each other and we're like, what is going on? This is outside of the ordinary. This is not a normal Sunday. And so I'm like, okay, well, I'm going to address the crowd here real quick. So I turn and I kind of tell her story, hey, this is Kristen.

You all know, who she is. She's, you know, believed in Christ. She's believed in his death, burial, and resurrection for the forgiveness of her sins. And so now we're going to, she's going to publicly profess her faith in baptism. And so we're standing there. And there's video of this on Dark Haller, you know, and Ward breaks it down almost frame by frame because there's a lot of weird things with that video footage. So we're sitting there and we get to the part to where you say the Trinitarian

formula, right? I baptize you in the name of the Father and the Son and the whole. And whenever I get to the Holy Spirit, you can see it on the video. She starts to just drop. And she's standing there very strange. It's very strange whenever you watch the video as she starts to drop. And so we just go with it in the name of the Holy Spirit and we just go with it. Whenever she comes back up, she makes this strange noise, this heaving sound, this crying sound. And if you actually go back and watch the video, you see, see that it startles the other guy in the water with me. To the point to where he backs up and he's almost in a defensive posture like this.

So she, after that, she puts her head, you know, her hands and her face in her hands and starts crying. We help her over to the bank. And where if she sits over, we get her to the bank, she sits on the boat ramp with the bank and she puts her head in her hands like this and just starts rocking back and forth. Like, she doesn't go and hug friends, family. She sits there and just rocks back and forth. Like, she's just completely rattled. You know, I say goodbye to friends and family and church people and all that. You know, they get her up and they're hugging on her and that kind of stuff. And so we get

into the car and my wife said, so when are we going to talk about what just happened? I was like, what do you mean? She said, the fact that there was a deep. that just come out of that girl and that everybody there saw that. I was like, you know, and again, at this point, keep in mind, I've, I've read into this stuff. I'm open to this stuff, but I'm still not there, right? I'm kind of skeptical. I'm like, well, you know, I thought that myself, but, you know, who knows? You know, who knows what happened?

I don't know. I don't want to say that and be wrong about it. You know, just trying to be careful and pastoral, right? So, you know, go on about my business, go home. And then by the end of that night, I had received at least four to five other phone calls from people who were there. So one of them was her sister and her brother-in-law. And she's like, Josh, I know my sister. And I can tell you that what happened was odd.

it was not normal. That was not her. And it startled me so bad that when I was videotaping, I dropped my phone on the riverbank. What happened? You know, I don't know what happened, but, you know, she's like, do you think that a demon came out?

I don't know that for certain, but maybe. I don't know. I did say an exorcism prayer while we were out there. And weird stuff started to happen after that. So, and then I get another call from, you know, another one of her good friends growing up who was also there. And she was like, Josh, I have never seen anything like that.

I feel like that I was in the presence of a supernatural miracle of God. I have never seen anything like that. Do you think that a demon came out of her? Same story with her. You know, I don't know that, but here's what I do know. I did say an exorcism prayer and things started to get weird after that. I don't know. But, and then the other pastor, I talked to him at like midnight that night.

And he was just like, hey, man. And this dude was like, he's like the most low-key guy in the world. Like, he's not, you know, he's not that kind of charismatic guy, you know, where that kind of stuff. He's like, hey, man, you know, I don't know if you feel the same way about this. But, you know, I thought that maybe whenever we baptized her that maybe a demon came out of her. I'm just like, you know, you're not the only person who said that to me today. So, but what happens is. I end up talking to Kristen sometime after and, you know, it's four years at this point.

So I can't remember exactly how long it was afterwards. But she said to me, she said some things that started to make sense to me. You know, I'm talking to her. And whenever I'm talking to her, she's a completely different person. Like, completely, you wouldn't even recognize, like, even looking at her. She looks like a different person. Like, she doesn't have this pale look about her anymore. She's more to herself, to her mind.

Like, you're talking to a person. Like, that's not how it was prior to this. And she said to me, well, she said, God delivered me that day. You know, I don't know if I believed whenever you asked me if I believed. But I certainly did in that moment. Right. And, you know, she's like, you know, she's like, and the enemy was fighting me. whenever I was out actually in the water.

I was like, what? So she actually ended up, so whenever we stepped out from the dock to the river, she actually broke her toe, stepping, just stepping onto the river back. We have no idea how she broke her toe, but she broke her toe.

But she pushed through, and we didn't know this at the time, she pushes through. And she said that whenever we got to the point, whenever I said, you know, in the name of the father's son, she starts to fall.

She said, it was like something grabbed a hold of me and pushed me into the river and tried to hold me there. Wow. That's the exact opposite. What I thought was, if we were going with that. Yeah. Wow. So she, she says, it's like something grabbed me and tried to drown me beneath the waters. And whenever I came up, it was just over. It was done. Like, I still have chills talking about it. Like, I've still yet to this day, never experienced anything quite like this. I've experienced. experienced weird things for sure, but not quite like this. And ever since then, I mean, man, married her, her and her husband.

You know, they moved. They got plugged in with a church down in North Carolina doing real good. She ended up finishing a degree at Liberty University, became a teacher at a Christian school. Just, you know, crazy, man, like has told her testimony in various places and podcasts, you know, was a part of this documentary, this docuseries, where she told her story. It's just an amazing work that God did in this person's life. And yeah, it's insane. Wow.

Wow. I think that's the first time I've heard the story told by somebody other than Ward. And no offense to Ward, but he's not the storyteller that you are. So, I mean, Ward is very good at telling stories through film. and he is the magic man behind everything that I've ever done. People are like, oh, Tony, you do so good. And it ain't me. It's Ward.

Ward is the... He's very Hamilton. Yeah. So, but I've heard this, you know, him and I have talked about it. And I've obviously seen the docu-series. But that's the first time I talked to you about this. And it is, wow. So that had to have snowballed you into the direction.

you when and it obviously sends you searching for answers. And, you know, like, what I do know of you is that you and I theologically come from very different backgrounds. And I, it, because I know you and Ward agree on a lot, which tells me that we come from different backgrounds. But I always tell Ward that we meet each other in the middle on a lot of this stuff, you know, like I, I don't know how to describe myself to a lot of people. Maybe years ago when we first connected, maybe we talked about this on the phone. But I mean, I went to a Pentecostal college, Assemblies of God. I was raised as Semmases of God, but I literally dormed with a bunch of Calvinists. And so I started learning Calvinism at a Pentecostal college. And I became like this hybrid, theoretically, that then when I

had my come to Jesus moment post-Bival college where I was like, I truly had this God encounter, not to go on to a theological conversation, but I truly, to this day, go back and forth and saying to myself, I don't think I could have said no in that moment. Like, I don't know if I did have a choice in that way. Because like, holy crap, I can't imagine walking out of that church at that funeral saying,

nah, I'm good, God, I'm good. But my experience leading into that moment was so, like, supernatural. And so it's funny how, you know, you and Ward and me, like, we kind of like, it's like there's this complimentary pieces to it all, you know? Because, I mean, I'm sure the people that stem from your theological background think you're going absolutely off the cliff crazy on something. 100%. So let's get into the book and stuff and how, like, obviously we laid the foundation with the exorcism. Now, let's get into the book because you're talking about in the book. book about the angels, the demons, and the gods of the nations.

And then you stem into more, I think, I forget the word you used earlier and stuff, but like the hypothetical things like UFOs, UAPs, cryptids. Yeah. On this show, they're not hypothetical. They're absolutely 100% legit. So from that logical standpoint, go. Yeah, yeah. So I'm there with you.

And whenever I say speculative. I'm just trying to use language to win the normies over. Sure. The ones who aren't there. So, yeah, so like you said, an event like this would obviously snowball and send you down a rabbit hole to find answers, right? Which Heiser's book had already started. But at this point, dude, it's went from a snowball to now it's a ginormous. Like, we have an avalanche now.

People at New Haven Church are like, what just happened? What did my pastor just do? Like, what did I see? So, dude, I had questions for a year, like a year afterwards. And that sent me down this rabbit hole to see what Christianity and the church had said about this stuff for 2,000 years. And, you know, the thing that I found out was that to the early church and even the medieval church, this stuff was not weird. It was just normal everyday life. It was baked into the, like I said, it was a part of every baptism.

So it was just baked into the life of the church. And the reason why I found it strange and why most of us modern people find it strange is because we have been disenchanted. We have been, like, just think about it. Dude, you go through school. And I don't know, some of you guys might be homeschooled. And if so, praise God. Or maybe you went to a Christian school. Praise God.

I did not. I went to public schools in West Virginia. And so, you know, I was fed the whole lives of, you know, evolutionary. You came from an ape, you know, whatever. And, you know, so even when I became a Christian, I didn't realize the profound effect that this worldview had on me and the way that I experienced reality. Right. Like, even though I would have acknowledged there are certainly unseen forces out there just in my practical day-to-day life, it didn't work out that way. If I couldn't see it, touch it quantified, it didn't really exist.

Or I would just reduce it down to like, well, maybe you need to go see a doctor or something like that. And then this event rocked me. So I ended up, you know, I actually ended up connecting with Dr. Heiser. So in our church to answer some of these questions, we did a sermon series called Spiritual Beings of the Bible. And this was in 2020. And so during that time, obviously, a lot of places were shut down. And even if you weren't shut down, there still wasn't a lot of people coming. And that was the case with us.

You know, we shut down for like a week. And then we were like, nah, we ain't doing this. We're getting back after it. Yeah, we're good. Yeah, we're good. And basically, I was like, hey, if you want to come and be in person, you are more than welcome to join us. I am not going to say you can't and that you got to do all this craziness.

So, you know, we shut down for one week because we thought we were dealing with the plague. But then we realized quickly that that wasn't the case. So anyway, since there wasn't a whole lot of people coming out at the time and everybody was on social media, we did a sermon series called, well, it wasn't a sermon series. It was just like an evening Bible study called Spiritual Beings of the Bible. And we ended up doing talks on angels, demons, giants, UFOs, like all of this kind of crazy stuff. And, dude, it went insane. Like, it went so insane that Dr. Heiser actually shared it on his personal page and actually watched, watched the one we did on Divine Counsel and interacted with it and, like, commented on the live stream and was, like, very supportive.

So I will never forget that. It was so awesome. So, but basically, all of the conclusions that I ended up coming to basically got put into this book. And so, you know, basically what I found out, just to give you a short version, maybe before we get in it a little bit deeper, is that the churches always believe this about angels and demons. They exist. And they have very particular roles in the cosmos. Like, not just are there like angels, but there are various kinds of angels. And those various kinds of angels have different roles, different authority ranks or different, different,

places in the cosmos, you could say. Traditionally, the way the church viewed it was that there were three choirs of angels. And, you know, there are some people who say that's because they have a higher rank than others. And whenever I look at the Bible, I'm not so convinced of that. It could certainly be the case. But I'm more convinced the reason why there are three choirs or three different sections of angels is because they're at work in different places of the cosmos. There are some who are in the presence of God, in his divine counsel at work in the heavenly places. There are some who are at work in the cosmos in various ways, making sure that the earth spins,

that the planets do what they do, making sure that life is able to thrive. And then there are some who are at work in a very particular way in the earth. And so, and then the thing that I found out too was that demons weren't quite what I thought they were. You know, I don't know about you, but until I encountered Dr. Heiser, I just, did not have a place in my head for giants and, like, there's significance in the Bible. But what I ended up coming to find out was that actually giants are the

origin point for where demons come in in the Bible. And it's fascinating. I've got a chapter on it. But, you know, one of the things that you'll see in the Bible, in particular, whenever you start to look at its language about demons, is that, you know, the Nephlin, right? Genesis chapter 6, right? You had the sons of God, the daughters of man, and there's various people who have various

different opinions on this, who the sons of God are, who the daughters of man are. Some say the sons of Seth and the daughters of Kane. The text doesn't say that. Whenever you look at the sons of God at anywhere else in Scripture, you see that they're angelic beings, especially in Job, chapter 1, especially in Job chapter 38, whenever God's creating the cosmos, it says that the sons of God rejoiced and sang. Obviously, that wasn't us because we weren't there when God created the cosmos.

So, anyway, in this Genesis 6th event, you have the sons of God, which I take to be angelic beings, and they intermingle with the daughters of men. And the product of that is the Nephilim, the giants. And, you know, there's various texts in the ancient world, not just in the Bible. I don't think you need the ancient text to make this case. I think you could just use the Bible to make this case. But if you look in the various ancient texts throughout the ancient world, you see that this reality of giants wasn't just a Christian idea or a Judeo,

you know, Christian idea. Dude, this was everywhere. Like the Greeks had giants. The Romans had giants. The Babylonians had giants. And not only are they giants, but they're this hybrid, right? They're of divine and human. Like, this is where the idea of demigods come from, right?

Like the ancient culture makers, right? But if you've ever read the epic of Gilgamesh. So this whole rabbit hole sent me to read and stuff like this. I read the epic of Gilgamesh. And Gilgamesh is he is the product of the divine and the human intermingling together. And he's a demigod. And not only is he a demigod, but he's a culture maker. He founds the city of Urich, right?

Like he's this king. And not only that, but it's even in the Greco-Roman world with people like Achilles. Right. Achilles is the product of divine and human interrelation. And he's a culture maker. He founds this culture. And he's this culture warrior. And it's fascinating. The Genesis 6 event is actually commenting on this. Right. It says that the giants, they were the mighty men of renown. That's culture maker language in the ancient world. They were the founders of the city. They're the guys in power that you all look up to. And here's what you need to know about them. They're actually not the. the semi-divine people you think that they are. They're actually the product of fallen divine beings coming down and taking something that they were never created by God to have, and that this is a corrupted version of how this is all supposed to work. And later on, God's obviously going to overcome that and reverse that in the incarnation of Christ, right? The divine and the human intermingling, but not in a corrupted way, but in a miraculous way. But yeah, but the fascinating thing,

to take this to this point here before we move forward. Whenever you trace this theme of giants throughout the Bible, right, they get different names. So the Nephilim, right? And then they get called the Anakim. And the Anakim is a tribe that descends from a giant name Anik. And then you get the Refi'em. The Refi'em are this giant clan. And there's these kings, these giant kings.

And the fascinating thing is that word Refayem gets used in various ways in the Hebrew Bible. So not only is it talk about these giant kings, it talks about their departed spirits that go into the underworld and cause havoc. Right. So it's this idea of they become, whenever they die, they become this disembodied spirit that continues to be at work here in the world. They are the dead. Like you'll see that language in the Psalms, like the dead. Or you'll see it in Isaiah, which if you look at the deep, more detailed version, this is in my book. But that's what they are. They are the demons.

So you get to the New Testament, you get this idea of Jesus talking about unclean spirits, right? Why do we never stop and ask ourselves why Jesus calls them unclean spirits? He doesn't call them unclean spirits because they forgot to take a shower. He calls them unclean spirits because they are the product of an unclean mixture that should not have happened. Right. And this is why we've got demons called Legion, right? Culture makers, warrior kings, that kind of idea. And so basically, if you follow that biblical theological thread, the giants, when they die, they're not like you and me.

They're semi-divine. And so because of that, their spirit lingers here. And that's whenever you hit the New Testament and you hear the demon language and, you know, unclean spirit language. It's connected to this word refiying. These are the spirits of the dead giants that were here before the flood. And they don't go anywhere as far as you. you have been able to find? I mean, it's not like, so if somebody were to cast out a demon, where does that demon go? Does it go to hell then? Or does it find another place to go here

on earth into another person or a flock of pigs or what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So whenever you look at the biblical picture, it seems to me that they certainly don't continue to reside in that person, but they do have the ability to go and to inhabit other things. Right. Like, so you see this in the ministry of Jesus, right? Jesus casts a slough of demons out of this person, right? And where do they go? They go into a whole gang of pigs, right? And then they go and they

jump into the water and drown themselves. Right? So, you know, you could say that they those, that group maybe ends back up in the underworld in Sheol, you know, that kind of thing, the watery abyss, that kind of thing. But it seems to me that these spirits have the ability to linger here. They have the ability to take up residence and be embodied in people. This was certainly the case in Canaanite rituals.

So I would have to find it. I don't have it on me right at this moment. And maybe I can find it. But in, yeah, yeah, actually, I have it here on my phone. I had it saved. In the ancient world, the thought was that these were being, that lingered and that you could invoke them ritually and that these ancient kings could come into you

and empower you. So there's this text. It's called KTU1.161. And you can find this work out there. This is Canaanite rich of funerary rights is what it is. So this is literature in the ancient world, right? Literature that surrounded the cultures of the Jewish people in the Second Temple period. right. So in this Refayim ritual, it was a ritual where the Refayem were summoned and invoked and were embodied so that somebody could be empowered by them. So here's what it says. It says, you are summoned, O Refayme of the earth. You are invoked, O counsel of Dittanoo. The refi is summoned. The refi is summoned. Is summoned is summoned. The Refiam of old. That's no wayic language. The refiame. The mighty men of old, the mighty men of renown. The Refaima of old are summoned.

You are summoned, O Refiama of the earth. You are invoked, O counsel of Dittanoo. So the thought in the ancient world was these were spirits that could be, they could take up residence in all sorts of things. They could take up residence in people using rituals. They could take up residence in animals. They could take up residence in idols, right? Typically, whatever, and this was me,

whatever I thought of demons, I thought of idols. I'm just like, oh, demons, you know, they're not really a thing. I mean, they are, but an idol is a block of wood, right? Like, it's nothing. Actually, in the ancient world, one of the things that I found in my research, you know, in this book, is that actually there was ancient rituals called the opening of the nostrils ritual, where these ancient pagans would do a ritual to open the nostrils of a wooden idol. so that this demon, this refaim, could take up residence and embodiment in this ritual.

And then they would bring offerings to it and try to feed it and things like that. So, you know, hopefully that answers your question somewhat. Do they go to hell? Maybe. There's certainly evidence in exorcistic rights in the Christian tradition, where if an exorcist casts out a demon, they'll say, you know, I command you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to be cast out and go to the foot of the cross where you're judged. You'll see that language a lot, especially in like high church traditions, especially like Catholic Orthodox, Anglican kinds of traditions.

But whenever you look in the Bible, too, there does seem to be evidence that they have the ability to linger and to continue to be here and to be able to be invoked and, you know, used in ritualistic purposes. Well, a couple things here. So one, you did something here on the show that I think is going to get backlash. So I got to talk to you about it just so that you can either get a reasoning or what. Sure. You just read that summoning ritual. Did you just summon Raphaim? Because I guarantee you, my wife's going to tell me we got emails about it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it. I get it. There's going to be some people who are spooked out by that. Do people still do that today with those kind of rituals to summon them? Oh, yeah, for sure. So I would say that the thing here is the intention. Like, are we, am I reading this to invoke this?

Am I doing a ritualistic? So the thing that we typically don't understand is that ritual is something that is embodied, right? So, for example, a baptism is a ritual, right? Like, it is a ritual where somebody is embodying in themselves the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Right. So whenever I'm plunged into the water, right, that is signifying my death. I am participating in a ritual where this death is being embodied in me. And whenever I come up out of the water, I am embodying the resurrection of Christ.

I'm coming out of the grave the same way that he did. So what I would say is that ritual is always accompanied by bodily action. Like you are playing out that ritual with your body. And so a baptism isn't a baptism without the ritual. Gotcha. Right? If I just read, I baptize you in the name of the Father and Son of Holy Spirit and there's no bodily ritual part to carry out that intention. It's not a baptism.

So I would say the same thing is true with this. Simply reading something is not being a participant in the ritual. Now, if you were going to use this and set up a ritual somehow to invoke them into you and you're expressing that bodily, that's when you're starting to get into the dangerous stuff. It's the same thing with the Lord's Supper. It's a ritual. Like I come up every single week in our church. The Lord's table is right there across from me. I'm in our church sanctuary.

Every single Sunday I say I read the words of institution, right, which is on the night that he was betrayed, Jesus took bread. And after blessing it, he broke it. He gave it to his disciples. He said, take it. This is my body. And then he took a cup and he blessed. He gave thanks. He said, this is my blood.

Drink of it all of you for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. It's Matthew 26, 26. If I'm not carrying that out bodily and actually participating in the eating of the bread and the drinking of the juice, I'm not actually participating in communion. I'm not actually carrying out the Lord's Supper. So that's the way that ritual works. It has to be embodied in you in a way that goes with this invocation stuff. Right. That's what I would say.

So on these lines of this, now this is going to actually, your answer to this question is going to give a very strong gauge, at least to me, just knowing, just knowing the way this all works, it's going to give me a strong gauge as to how far you have come from four or five years ago. How often do you believe people come across demons unknowingly? So are we walk? man, you really have jumped off the cliff, haven't you? I love it. I love it. All time. So, okay, so all the time. So, I mean, you're saying, like, we could be, we could, you know, leave our house, get in our car, drive to Walmart, do our grocery shopping and come home. And in that time span, come across demonic entities, whether they're just roaming in another realm or they're possessing people around us. And so whatever your answer is to that, I would say, well, yeah, just answer that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the thought in the church fathers, especially, especially whenever you get to the desert fathers, is that you, whether you know it or not, you are constantly engaged in a spiritual war. And that seems to be the thought of St. Paul in Ephesion 6, right? Like, we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, the principalities, the cosmic forces of darkness, right?

So you need to put on the armor of God and you need to have that up on you all the time because whether you know it or not, you're engaged in a war. So here's the fascinating thing. Whenever I got into the fathers, the church fathers, especially the desert fathers, they said that whether you knew it or not, you were in some ways embodying a demonic presence whenever you gave in to anger. whenever you gave in to lust. And that's not to say,

like, so for example, if you're listening, right, like you've got that voice in your head of lust and you act on it, right? Then you are giving body to a demonic force, right? Because obviously lust does not come from God. So if it doesn't come from God, where's it come from? It obviously comes from the enemy, right? And so it's the same thing with this kind of thing. So I don't think that a believer in Christ can be possessed, right?

Like I believe that if you have the Holy Spirit residing in you, that the Holy Spirit can't be unseated in you. You know, there's language in Ephesians where it talks about that you are sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. You know, if you're sealed by the Spirit, then I don't think that you can be unsealed. But I will say this. I think that even if you are a believer, whether you know it or not, you can. be engaged in demonic activity and be embodying that and not even be aware of it. So, yeah. Yes. So I am trying to look as fast as possible and listen at the same time, which is not

doing well for me. So I'm just going to kind of go off memory here. But based off what you just said, man, it doesn't that ring true to me. I think it's Ephesians 4 talks about, you know, not giving into anger. And I believe. it's either the anger or the language that comes out of our mouth, being careful with that because it is a tool used by Satan. This is me extremely paraphrasing because it just, you know, but it really does ring true with what you said just now and stuff because it really kind of gives, what you did is basically give a picture and an image

as to what is being said, and I believe Ephesians. for. And so very impactful stuff there. Now, let me, can I read a couple quotes? Yeah, please. Go ahead. Yeah. So I've got a couple quotes here from some fathers just to back this up, right, to show that this isn't just Josh Robinson's novel idea or thought, that this is actually rooted in church history. So St. Anthony the Great said this in his sixth letter. So if you want to go and find this, you can find it in his sixth letter in verses 50 through 51. He says, you will not not find their sins and iniquities revealed bodily for they are not visible bodily. So basically he's saying that demons, you're not going to find a demon walking around like flesh and blood body,

like the way we see humans, right? He said, you should know that we can be their bodies and that our souls receive their wickedness. And when it has received them, then it reveals them through our body in which we dwell. Wow. So Evagrius, the solitary, he says this in what's called the Philicalia. This is an Eastern work for the church father. So if you guys want to go look, he says, the demon of anger. So just stop right there.

Let's reframe this. Like, let's think about, so this is where this whole worldview that we're talking about here, angels, demons, where it becomes very practical now. He says, the demon of anger. So whatever you experience that unrighteous anger, that's not from God. That is demonic. He says, the demon of anger suggests images of our parents, friends, or kinsmen being gratuitously insulted, making us say or do something vicious. The demon of Averis suggests that we should attach ourselves to the wealthy.

So this is how, this is the kind of war that we're in. A lot of us are waiting for flesh and blood demons to come and come knocking on their doors, and that's not how it works. The way that they do this and the way that they are at war with us, those of us who are in Christ, is through these passions, right? Through the anger. Until the point to where you finally just give up and you stop fighting the battle, you say, come on, come on in. Go ahead. You can be embodied here. Or if you do ritual embodiment and invite them into you.

So that's how this stuff works. I'm telling you, man, I feel like this conversation was supposed to happen. We've toyed with this so much, but even for me personally, I mean, it's not even for the audience right now. This is just for me. Like, I have just this week, I think it was on Monday, told my wife about this and how I feel like my anger is being used as a tool against me. And there's been several. And we're talking about, like, her and I were talking about bitterness, you know, like, you know, do, I don't just be a little transparent here publicly, but just doing what we do on a daily basis, what we do for a living, there are times that jadedness does come into play. You can only deal with, like, like, all we ever do all the time is think about this podcast. Like, that's it. That's our, like, it's like, it's like you going to job, your job for. for eight hours a day. Now imagine somebody that, imagine you're the person who owns the company

that you work at, they think about it even more than what you do eight hours a day. That's the position I'm at, right? So I'm sitting here and all I do all the time, I wake up thinking about the podcast, I go to bed thinking about it, I deal with the issues of it all the time. And you kind of get jaded when you have people emailing you just being disgustingly nasty to you. And those are open doors for the anger to come and take root and hold. And just this week, I've been seeing it. Like, it's like, and I'm not even saying like, oh, I've been seeing little hints of it. No, I've been living in anger.

And I've just this week realized that that in itself has become a root and hold in my life. And I need to let it go. And just yesterday, you know, because like I said, this is all we do. This is our living. Something negative happened. And I started talking and then I just brought it back down, took some deep breaths. And I'm like, I'm not like almost like that whole phrase, not today, Satan. Like that's how I felt.

I was like, I'm not doing it anymore. I'm not feeding this beast. And so I just, what you just said with the church fathers and I think it was St. Anthony, like, man, dude, like that, that just tripped me out. And I'm just, I had to take that moment just to express to you because I knew I forget. Because I prefer what I just said to you. I prefer that to be off air. It's nobody's business, you know, but at the same time, like, I knew I'd forget.

So I had to bring it up. I really appreciate you sharing that. Now, I do want to kind of jump back a little bit here because earlier that I made a note of this, you were mentioning the roles of angels. And it's a phrase that perfectly depicts something that I always felt, but never put that kind of phrase to it, the roles of an angel, the job of an angel, and how they have different roles.

And I think there's probably a depiction in that with the story of Daniel, how he was praying, and it took three weeks for the angel to come, and the reason for that, you know what I'm saying? Yes. And so, like, in that story, just for people to understand, in that story, he's praying for something. I don't even know what it was. Maybe you know, I don't know.

But he's praying for something. And it takes 21 days, I believe, for the angel to come and appear for him. And he's like, I'm sorry. And I think he even used the word, I'm late. I am sorry, I'm late. He does. I was warring with the prince of Persia, I believe. A demonic.

And it's just like, this angel, his clearly in this passage, at least, his job was warring. And it wasn't until, say, Michael the archangel came to, to release. him that he could come and answer a prayer. Like, that's how logistically, uh, intertwined all this stuff is. And so when you brought the idea of roles of angels, I was like, man, like, let's get into that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

So the passage you're talking about is Daniel 10. And like you're saying, Daniel's praying. And he's like, hey, just so you know, I've been warring. I was held. He's kind of like, again. Ooh. Sorry, folks. I dropped my camera here.

Um, but he's, he's warring, right? with the prince of Persia. So for those who don't know, so in the Bible, there is language of like principalities, right? And so this is where that language comes from, is from like this language of principality. Now, for those who don't know, a principality in the biblical worldview

is an angelic being that has dominion over a geographical region. So they're princes. Okay, so the word principality, basically means this is a place, a geographical region ruled by a prince. So it's like the same thing as like a monarchy, right? A monarchy is a geographical region ruled by a monarch, a king. Well, principality is a place ruled by a prince. So whenever you see that language of principality,

what it's talking about is this is a place ruled by an angelic being called a prince. And so Persia apparently has. an angelic being ruling over them. So this is the language you see in Psalm 82, right? The gods of the nations, right? Whenever, you know, God talks about he's going to step into the divine counsel and judge the gods, you know, that whole thing. So, and so Archangel, too, this is really tied very closely, biblically,

with the idea of principality as well. Right? So in Greek, principality is archa. So if you've ever heard of the archons. or the archae, right? That's the principalities. And so the archaengalos in Greek is like this angel that is in between just a regular angel,

who is a human messenger and a principality. They're the one that's kind of there. So they do battle here and bring messages here. So that's what an angel is. An angel simply means Anglos in Greek or Malak in Hebrew. It simply means a messenger. So they are the ones who work most, closely with you and I, right? Like whenever an angel comes and brings a message to somebody,

it's usually, now if it's a high message, right, a big, big message, they'll send an archa Anglos to do it, an archangel. So that's why an archangel comes to Mary and, you know, to Daniel and all that kind of stuff, because it's a, it's a more important message that needs to be heard. But so, yeah, so those are the three angels that work closely with humanity, right? The principalities, the archa, the archangels, the archangels, and then the angels. So that's the ones that are really at work here on Earth that, you know, if, you know, you see in the Bible, somebody gets a message that's usually there. So when Paul talks about we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers of principalities, like he's talking about like this is like spiritual beings who are over geographical places and are keeping them purposely in darkness. That's what Paul has in mind here.

He's thinking of pagan nations who are given over to worship of foreign gods. That is a principality. A spiritual being that has rebelled against God, has become a God to these people, and is accepting worship. So that's the kind of thing. Now, that's not the only choir of angels. There are other choirs of angels, too. So the other choir of angels, the second choir, this one you can think of being at work in the cosmos, the cosmos, and in the earth in some ways as well, right?

Like through like the natural things of the earth, you know, that kind of thing. So this choir of angels is made up of the, we'll get to the other one. But the dominions and then after the dominions, the powers, and then the authorities. And so, you know, whenever you get into some of this stuff, especially the original language and, you know, that kind of thing. One of these, the authorities in particular, are called the, I believe it's the virtues. I believe that that's them. Let me just glance here. Actually, I don't believe that it's them.

Actually, I think that it's the, see here. The, no, yeah, it is them. It's been about a year since I've looked at my own book here. Sorry, it's the powers. So the powers, for example, in this one, okay? So the powers in most translations, especially once you hit Latin, is translated as virtues. Now, the thought here is this. These are what are called elemental spirits in other places.

Right. So spirits that are at work in the. elements. Right? So, like, when Moses parts the Red Sea, and you see, and then they go through the water, and then they come up to Mount Sinai, right? And then they get up on the mountain, and then you see in other places in the scriptures where it talks about that there were angels in the thunder and the lightning, right?

That's the elemental spirits. That's the virtues. Paul talks about these in Galatians. Or, sorry, Coloss. Well, I think it's Galatians and Colossians. I don't think about it. But he talks about that, you know, if you're in Christ, you are no longer a slave to the elemental spirits, right? To these powers, these kinds of things.

Because these were people, these were beings in the ancient world where people would make offerings to these kinds of things. Right. And you would do it for good weather. Right. Because if you have good weather, that means you have a good crop yield. And that means that your family is going to have a good time because you're going to be able to eat. But if you don't, if you make the elemental spirits. mad or the virtues or whatever language you want to use for them, that means that, man,

you're going to, you're going to have a hard time. You're going to, the weather's going to be bad. Not only is the weather going to be bad, but you might have a flood and it's going to wipe out everything, right? So the thought was, is that you had to appease these types of beings and you did it through ritual sacrifice. This is, I mean, this is not, I mean, this is still a thing. Like, people still do this even in Appalachia with, okay, so in the coal mines, okay, so I'm from

Appalachia, right? And coal mining is the big industry here in the coal fields, right? So the thought here is this. So in the coal mines, they have these cryptids, whatever you want to call them, spiritual beings, called blue caps. I don't know if you've ever heard of a blue cap before. No. A blue cap.

Okay, so this is fascinating. A blue cap is a fairy. So this idea actually came to Appalachia through Scots-Irish settlers. So they immigrated from Ireland, Scotland. They come over here. They settled in Appalachia. Appalachia is very Scots-Irish, culturally speaking. So whenever they settled here, they brought this folklore with them.

So if you're in a coal mine, and sometimes you'll see what, It's been reduced down to science now, right? You'll see a blue flame go overhead. And that's a warning that the gas is high there. Well, in this folklore, the thought was that was a blue cap fairy. So the flame is blue, right? It's a fairy that has a blue cap. And it's warning you, you need to be careful.

The gas is high. You need to. So what they would do is they would take lunch from their lunch buckets. And they would leave them little offerings in the dark places of the mines. And that would keep the mine from having an explosion or something like that. So like this thought, everybody like, oh, who offers, who offers stuff to elemental spirits? Coal miners in West Virginia do.

Like, this is a thing, still yet. And people do it too. Still yet, like in, you know, pagan circles where they leave stuff on the edge of their property for fairies. Like, in culture. So, fairy is another name for what the Bible would call an elemental spirit. So whatever people are like, oh, that's, you know, fairies don't exist. Well, yeah, you're not going to find the word fairy in the Bible, but in the biblical worldview, a fairy would fall under this concept of elemental spirit, something that is attached to nature,

that is making sure that nature ought to function the way that. So the thought was, is the virtues work the miraculous things in nature, right? When God did something miraculous, right? When nature was, the laws of nature were overcome. That was God using these beings to work his miracle. So it's not outside the realm of possibility to think that there are some of those beings who have fallen, and they accept worship and offerings and those kind of things. So, you know, anyway, that's basically the rest of the beings in that hierarchy.

You know, the dominions are basically the taskmasters of that, you know, that kind of thing. They're kind of like the managers. They make sure that everything goes right, you know, and that kind of thing. And so that's, you know, that's the second choir of angels. And then the third one, the last one, this is where you're going to be familiar with these ones. These are the seraphim, the cherubim, and the thrones. Like these are the ones who are not so much at work in the earth, like talking to you and me, right? Like the angels or the archangels or that kind of thing.

These are the ones that are work in the cosmos. These are the ones that are in the closest proximity to God. Right. You see this in the Bible like in Isaiah's vision in Isaiah 6, right? He gets this vision of the Holy Temple, the train of God is filling the temple, and he sees the seraphim there, and they're singing, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. Right. And now the fascinating thing is whenever you look at iconography attached to the seraphim, they're depicted as very serpentine.

They're like, like, if you look at iconography from ancient Israel, they look like serpents with wings. And they're fiery. And actually, it's fascinating. The word seraphim in the Bible actually gets used in other places. Like, whenever Israel's out in the wilderness and they're getting bit by fiery serpents, that's seraphim. So, I think this ties together a lot, at least it does for me. you get into the Genesis account and there's a serpent there. There's a talking serpent.

And later on, he's depicted as this flaming dragon in Revelation 12, right? Who's up in the stars, all of that, right? So everybody asked the question, they're like, why is the serpent in the garden? Why is he there to begin with?

That's because this was the divine council meeting spot of God on Earth. Right? This is where God's throne room was at was in Eden. It's like the temple, right? God's presence tabernacled in the tabernacle, and it resided in the temple as well, right? So this was like the cosmic temple. The Garden of Eden was the place where God met people on Earth.

So it makes sense that that's why that there would be spiritual beings there. It also makes sense of why is it that Eve is not taken back whenever this serpent talks to her? This would have been a being that she would have seen. She would be used to seeing this being. And it explains why can this being talk. And it also explains the curse, right? Like whenever the serpent deceives the woman, God gives a very particular curse to him.

Do you remember what it is? He says, you're going to crawl on your belly. Serpents already crawl on their bellies. But seraphim don't. Seraphim are in the presence of God. They are the highest of angels. So for a seraphim to crawl on its belly means that you are no longer in my presence. You are cast out forever because you have done this.

this thing. So I think that Satan was a seraphim. And so, yeah, I think that's why he's depicted as the Great Dragon in Revelation. You know, that's why Goliath later on

is depicted as wearing a coat of scales. So in the ancient world, there's, you can go out there and you can Google this. In the ancient world, people used to wear armor made of scales, like crocodile scales or that kind of thing. So that they would look like a big serpent out on the battlefield,

like a dragon, right? So it's amazing, right? So David cuts the head off of the serpent, right? God promises the serpent, his head's going to get crushed. Jesus dies. He crushes the head of the serpent. He's crucified at Golgotha, which is the place of the skull. It's called Golgotha because that's where the head of Goliath is buried, right?

Goliath of Gath, Gagoth. So, yeah, so that's seraphim. They are usually the high people in the pecking order. Then after that, you got the cherub them and their throne guardians. They guard sacred space. So if you were to go into Israel's temple, right, before you got to the most holy place, right, the holy of holies where the Ark of the Covenant was at, you would see a veil with seraphine on it. That's because they're guarding the place where God's presence is at. And this is in Genesis.

Do you remember what God stationed outside the Garden of Eden, this sacred space when humans were kicked out? An angel. It says that he put the cherub him there with the flaming sword that gleaned in every direction. They are guarding the sacred space of Eden so that something unholy can't come back into it. At least not right now. Later on, Jesus is going to die and the temple veil is going to be rent, which means that the access to paradise and God's presence is no longer. veiled. It's no longer cut off to humanity because we have been reconciled to Him in Christ and, you know, all of that magnificent, glorious things that the Bible says. But that's what Seraphim do. Or sorry, what Cherabim do. They guard sacred space. They guard the places of God, the place where His holy presence is at. And then you've got the thrones, which are the fascinating ones. You especially see him in Ezekiel. They're the eyes. They're wheels within wheels, eyes within eyes. And the fascinating.

thing about this is this is usually the type of stuff people talk about with UFO stuff. Uh, yeah. I mean, was it? Ezekiel has a great depiction of what we would call a UFO. Basically. Yeah. He has, he sees, uh, these thrones or these wheels within wheels. And there are eyes all around it, right?

So, yeah. So, uh, very common phenomenon that you see, uh, you know, know in contact e-literature, like with UFO type stuff. Yeah, another fascinating connection point, and maybe this will get us into some weirder territory here. Does it strike anybody weird that in a lot of the contact e-literature, whenever you're looking at UFO stuff, that aliens are always obsessed with human anatomy and sexual stuff?

Always. Always, right? Like, this seems to be the MO of the, of the sons of God from the beginning. Right? Like you even get into Enochian literature, right? And again, like I said, I've not referred to any of that

throughout this entirety of the podcast because I think you can make the case for these things without this stuff. I think it's fascinating, and it gives you a broader imagination for how this stuff was thought about in the ancient world. But you get, it's fascinating.

You get into the Enochian literature and you see that the sons of God not only took the daughters of men, but they gave them the lessons of the watchers. which is basically how to do magic, how to do ritualistic stuff, how to trace the stars, how to do herbology,

you know, how to do mining, all of these types of things. And whenever you know, you read contact e-literature, the message is always very related to that, like giving some kind of knowledge to enlighten humanity. So to me,

So this is where, you know, like I said at the beginning of this conversation, this is where the book starts to get into more speculative things, which I wouldn't call them speculative, but, you know, for people who aren't introduced, I use that kind of language to gently break them in. But, but yeah, basically the case that I make in that section of the book is I attribute a lot of what we call UFO UAP phenomenon. I attribute that to the sons of God, the same sons of God in Genesis 6, who are the law. watchers of Enoch who gave the lessons of the watchers to humanity so that we could use those things to destroy ourselves and all those types of things. So I've talked for a hot minute here. No, you're fine. So with what you just said, though, I mean, do you generally think then that UFOs are of what I believe in the common thought generally moving forward has been the last few years is that it's developing, well, let's me put it this way.

It's a developing thought that people think that UFOs are more interdimensional than they are from some far off galaxy. I mean, if they are what you're saying, I mean, to me, that just seems like a one plus one equals two kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I think my personal take on UFOs, and it's very similar to Jacques Fillet, you know, who was a euphologist and John Keel, who was a ufologist and a journalist, he also wrote Mothman Propheces. I like to think of them as it is a interdimensional type beings. I don't think that they're from some planet somewhere else. I think that they are beings that have always been here.

They've just presented themselves in different ways to us. And I actually got a couple of quotes here that I think people will find fascinating about this. So Gray Barker, for those of you who don't know, Gray Barker was a West Virginia native. He wrote a book called The Silver Bridge. It's basically a mytho historical look at the collapse of the Silver Bridge of Point Pleasant. with the Malthman. But he wrote about this stuff, and he said this. He says, as man's technology improved and many religions were discarded, the phenomenon was obliged to take new manifestations

and establish a new frame of reference. Phantom armies and angels so frequently reported in the past were now replaced by transmogrifications that appeared to match man's own technological advancements. Jacques Valet says it this way. He says this being the case, the development of a new myth feeding upon this duality

is entirely predictable. In the absence of a rational solution to the mystery and public interest in the matter of being intense, it is quite likely that in the coming years every new brand of charlatanism will use it as a base, although it's not possible to predict its exact form.

we may very well be living in the early years of a new mythological movement. And it may eventually give our technological age, it's Olympus, right? Mount Olympus, right, where the gods are at, right? The pantheon. It's fairyland or it's wahala, whether we regard such a development as an asset or a blow to our culture. So basically what they're saying is, you know, this phenomenon that we're experiencing as UFOs, aliens, you know, that kind of thing, It's been around for a very long time. It's changed its appearance.

As we've advanced, it's presented to us a different kind of aesthetic, and that we may very well be living in a new mythological movement where people may not believe in gods so much anymore, but they certainly believe in aliens, and they feel that functional role of deity in many of them's head. Dude, and you see this in works of people like Dr. Stephen Greer, like with the CE5 movement, right? they are literally going out into the desert and using rituals to invoke close encounters

of the fifth kind with these types of beings. Yes. So, yeah. Fascinating stuff. Listen, we're going to start winding down here. I want to remind people, the name of the book is re-enchanting the unseen. This is a book that is going to do a lot of what you just heard. And there's a question that I have. head about, I don't know, 15, 20 minutes ago that I got to just, I got to ask you. And I don't even know if there's an answer to this. I don't know if this is, sometimes I come up with the questions that people are like, I'd never even considered that.

Like, where is your brain? But warring angels, have you ever considered what that even looks like? Because for me, like, I, my first thought is, you know, like, I mean, if you want to go, like the very generic route, it's like, oh, look, an angel with wings, and he's got a flaming sword, and he just swings it really hard. But I started thinking, I was like, you know, when you were talking, I was like, I really, like, I really wonder what the logistics and what that actually looks like, a warring angel. Like, I mean, we're, we're picturing warring of 2,000 years ago of, you know,

David warring with Goliath and what that looked like, but that's changed. Like, we wore different than they did back then. So why would angels be subject to something so maybe archaic of using, you know, a sword or something. I don't know. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah. So this is, I think, get us back into some practical territory here. So I was looking for this quote that I actually had saved and I can't, I can't find it anywhere, but it's from Peter Craft. But he talks about, let me see here. Let's see if I can find it real quick. He talked about that if you would have asked, you know, ancient people what it meant when nations went to war against each other, right?

They would have said, there is something more than just flesh and blood happening here. There is principalities and rulers vying for dominion here. And this is, this isn't a new thought. This is actually a thing, even in Greco-Roman culture, with their succession myth, like, especially in the Greek world, where the gods basically do war with each other and then they allot land to each other. Like, okay, you're going to rule this land. I'm going to rule this land. And then whenever they disagree, their nations that they're over go to war with each other.

So, yeah. So I think that, man, let's just get real. Let's get practical here. I think that what you are living through right now is powers doing war against one another. I think that what we're living through right now, call it the fall of the West, call it the fall of an empire, call it whatever you want. What you are living through right now is you are living through principalities, not just warring against flesh and blood, but against one another for dominion. They are warring so that they can get as much powers they can possibly get so that you will worship them. so that they can esteem themselves.

Whenever nations go to war, there is more than just a flesh and blood reality. Yes, there is that reality, and that's a tragic, awful thing. But there is also a spiritual reality of that as well. Every single nation, right? Like, even churches, like open the book of Revelation. You see that even in the book of Revelation,

each church has an angel, right? The letters that John writes are to the angel of the church in Smyrna, to the angel of the church in Laodicea, right? The thought is, and you see this in Daniel, right? The nations have angels, the prince of Persia, the prince of Greece, the prince of Israel. Michael is your prince. God has assigned angels. This gets back into the whole hierarchy of angels that we talked about earlier, right?

Every nation has an angel. It has a spiritual being. Some of them are in rebellion against God. Some of them aren't. There are places out there that honor Christ is king. their nations. Those places have angelic beings that are doing the things that they were put there to do, to lead people to light, to life, to righteousness, and ultimately to the worship of the true God. But there are some angels out there that are in rebellion, and they are leading their people to things

that are dark, that are evil. Assassinations, murdering innocent lives, greed to where we will murder people. All of these things. You ought to see those things as manifestations of spiritual realities. Like we talked earlier, right, about anger, the demon of anger, being embodied. Whenever you see these things happening at a countrywide level, a nationwide level, that's how you ought to see those things as well. Right. These are principalities doing war against one another and vying for the worship of the people.

That's my take on it. That is a, like you said, practical. It's a very practical way of looking at it. And it really kind of gives a spiritual significance to the world that we live in currently. So, listen, Sir Josh, I think this was long overdue. And I think it was a great conversation. Reenchanting the Unseen Realm is the book. And the podcast is Tell Me Strange.

things. People should definitely go check it out and enjoy what you have to offer because I think that, you know, we lost a good one with Heiser, but people like you are very capable and willing to pick up the torch and keep, you know, hammering away at that message of the unseen realm. And so I thank you very much for coming on the show, man. Yeah, man. I appreciate it. It was a lot of fun and hope to do it again here at some point in the future. Absolutely. Next time it's in the studio. Phenomenal. Well, that's the short, everybody.

I really hope you enjoyed it. If you did enjoy it, please share the show with your friends. I don't care where or how you share the show. Just share the show if you enjoyed it. That's the best thing you can do to help the show grow. Share the show. Now, friends, I just saw the lake monster underneath me, I think, and I'm going to jump in real quick and wrangle it.

I'm going to get in a headlock, drag it to shore like Hercules, and show you guys pictures on my Instagram, the Confessionals podcast on Instagram. Go follow us because that's where we're posting the Sea Monster pictures. I'm about to wrangle it. it now. But friends, until next Tuesday, just remember, the elites don't want you to know this, but you can convert to Christianity and live forever. See you.