The Narrow Path Radio 08/27/2026

Steve Gregg: Good afternoon and welcome to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we're live for an hour each weekday afternoon. It's a live program so that you can call in and ask questions about the Bible or the Christian faith for us to discuss. You can call in if you disagree with the host and want to discuss that on the air, feel free to do that. The number to call is 844-484-5737. I'm going to give you that number again: 844-484-5737. And we have a couple of lines open if you want to call right now. You can probably get through, looks like it. So, this weekend, I'm speaking in a number of places in, I don't know if you call it the Central Valley or what you call it here in California. It's to me it's Northern California, but obviously California goes a lot further north than this. It's probably Central Valley or something like that. I don't know the right name for it. But then I didn't know the name for the place I lived in California, which is called the Inland Empire, until fairly recently. Anyway, so Fresno, I'm talking at Fresno, Coarsegold, Clovis, Oakhurst. These are areas I'm speaking in this weekend, starting tonight in Oakhurst, but then there's quite a lot of places actually, including some things that are not public meetings where I'm filming some podcasts with somebody who lives up here, which is six hours worth while I'm here. There's probably another six or seven meetings in these four days I'm up here. If you are in those areas and want to join us, go to thenarrowpath.com, go to the tab that says announcements and when you do, you can find today's or tomorrow's or the next day's dates. You can see where I'm speaking and you can join us if you'd like to. All right, we're going to go to the phones now and let's see what we want to do first. We've got Michael in Denver, Colorado is first in line. Hi, Michael, welcome.
Michael: Hi, Steve, good to talk to you again. I just had a quick comment and question today and I'll take my answer over the air. So, this and first of all I apologize if anyone's brought this up because this is the first time I got to listen to the show this week, but this Thursday, tonight, August 27th, there's going to be a partial lunar eclipse which is going to turn the moon a copper red color, kind of creating a blood moon and it's sparked biblical speculation from a lot of people saying it evokes Joel 2:31, which reads: "The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the day of the Lord come." And he references also include Acts 2:20 and Revelation 6:12, which kind of describe the moon becoming like blood signaling the start of apocalyptic events. And I was just wanting to kind of get your impressions on this or kind of your interpretation of those verses that talk about the moon turning into blood.
Steve Gregg: Well, the moon turning into blood no doubt just speaks of it turning blood red as opposed to the rock in space doesn't turn into liquid made of red and white corpuscles, for example. To turn to blood means to turn red like blood. And you're talking about a phenomenon which you say is going to be tonight where that kind of happens. Yeah, and there's been quite a few of those actually not too long ago. In fact, there have been so many of them that one prophecy pastor teacher wrote a book about the blood moons and he thought this was somehow a sign of the times. And actually he had a certain set of dates that he thought they were signaling and it didn't happen, which is always going to happen whenever people make those kind of predictions. The statement in Joel's prophecy in Joel chapter 2 is quoted by Peter in Acts chapter 2 as being in the process of being fulfilled in his day. That prophecy in Joel, it says that God's going to pour out His Spirit on all flesh. Of course, that's what Peter said was happening there at Pentecost and that your sons and daughters will prophesy and all that. But then it goes on and talks about a judgment which was coming too. And so it says there, "I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord." And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Now, the fact that it ends with that statement, whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved and that Peter quotes that as being true in his time and of course Paul quotes it also in Romans 10, that line, which means he applies this prophecy to our time as well or to the church age, not the end of the times, but the times that the apostles were in as well as now, whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. But Peter specifically indicated that these things were happening or beginning to happen in his day. The first instance of it was the pouring out of the Spirit at Pentecost. The blood and the fire on earth and the pillars of smoke I believe were fulfilled when Jerusalem was set on fire by the Romans. There were pillars of smoke, there was blood running through the streets. Josephus tells us there was certainly fire, the temple was burned down. And that these things will all come to pass, it says, before that great and awesome day of the Lord. Now, the great and awesome day of the Lord I believe is the end of Temple Judaism, which came to an end with the destruction of the Temple in AD 70. And that's why Peter saw it as relevant to his generation. Jesus said it would happen in that very generation. And so Peter sees the first inkling of it with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and so he quotes the whole passage as, "Yeah, this is it, this is the day of this fulfillment." Now, of course, the destruction of Jerusalem was like 40 years later, but they both happened within a single generation. So it's not at the same day or the same hour or the same week or year, but it was in the same generation, this transition from the old covenant era to the new covenant era was what was taking place in that generation. Just like the generation that came out of Egypt. They were liberated from Egypt, but they didn't come into their inheritance until 40 years later. So there was a transitional generation between the deliverance from Egypt and when the old covenant was made and their coming into their promises. So also when the new covenant was made, there was a 40-year transitional generation before Jerusalem was destroyed. Now, I think the reason for that, it sometimes takes a whole generation to get the old ways out of their mind. We see that the Jews that came out of Egypt, they still had a lot of Egypt in them. And so he had to kind of wean them of those Egyptian ideas like golden calves and things like that over a period of a generation so the next generation was freer from it, the ones who weren't born in Egypt. Likewise, the Jews had been under the law and the temple and so forth for 1400 years and even when Jesus came and died for our sins and ended the need for the temple, the Jewish Christians still kind of went to the temple. They didn't need to, it was unnecessary, but they were just used to it. It's like getting Egypt out of the people who were rescued from Egypt. God had to get the whole Judaism out of the Jews who had been raised that way, even after the new covenant had come. So He gave them, I think quite mercifully, He didn't make them turn on a dime. He gave them a generation to get the old system out of their minds and then to come into the full realization of the new. So that was a very significant time. Most of the prophets had something to say about that period of time and Joel was one of them. And Peter said, "This is that period of time." So that's my understanding of the blood moon that he refers to there. I hope that clarifies something. Let's talk to Sasha from Oak Grove, California. Welcome to the Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
Sasha: Hi, Steve. I have a couple of questions in regards to demons, Satan, devil. So there's a couple, but they kind of all go together. So the first one is, who are demons and where do they come from? And then can a believer be inhabited by demons? And in what capacity can the devil devour you? And that's coming from 1 Peter 5:8 where it says be sober—yeah, that one. And then I'll take my question offline.
Steve Gregg: Okay, that's fine. And you've asked some hard questions because the Bible itself actually doesn't give us the answers to those things. Some people think it does, but I don't think it does. The first is, who are the demons and where do they come from? I was raised as a Christian under the impression that there was a third of the angels that fell when Lucifer fell and that when we deal with demons today, we're dealing with the fallen angels. Now, that is a possibility. All I can say is the Bible doesn't tell us that. The Bible does mention there are fallen angels a couple of times anyway, if not more. And yet it never tells us if the demons are them or not. When it talks about the fallen angels in 2 Peter chapter 2 verse 4 and in Jude verse 6, it says that the angels that have sinned are kept in chains under darkness waiting for the judgment of the great day, which doesn't sound like they're out and about possessing people, though they may be, it may be a figurative way of talking about things. But the Bible does not give us any authoritative answer to the question, are the fallen angels the demons? And there are people who have other views. There are Christians who think that the demons are simply the disembodied spirits of previous wicked people who've lived. Some think there was a wicked, rebellious generation before Adam—I don't believe that, but that's called the Gap Theory. They think that there were other people before Adam and Eve and that they were rebellious and God had to wipe them out and that the demons could be the spirits of those people set loose upon us. Others have thought it might be the spirits of the Nephilim. The Nephilim are the giants that are mentioned in Genesis chapter 6. There's not really a reason in the world, that is I should say a biblical case to be made at all, for the Nephilim's disembodied spirits are now the demons. I don't see that in the Bible anywhere, but it could be. I mean we just don't know. The Bible does not tell us where they came from or what they are. The idea that they're fallen angels is a pretty widespread view. And since we know there are fallen angels, it becomes a view that is not impossible. The idea that they are the departed spirits of wicked people who in some way have become slaves of Satan and have to serve him in their afterlife, that view is not without its adherents also. I don't know that that makes an awful lot of sense biblically, but we're just not given a straight answer. What we do know is the demons are under the command of Satan, apparently. The Pharisees referred to Beelzebub as the prince of the demons or the ruler of the demons. And in Revelation 12:7 it talks about how Satan and his angels, which means messengers, probably demons, are making war against Michael and his angels. It says in Matthew 25:41 that the goats and the sheep are separated and the goats are sent off to everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. It sounds like, now if we say "his angels," we may think, "Oh, then that's talking about the fallen angels." Well, it could be, it could well be. But remember, angels simply means messengers. Actually, the devil's messengers could even be living human beings who are his messengers. In fact, Paul says something like that in 2 Corinthians 11 where he said that Satan himself appears as an angel of light, how much more his ministers or his messengers appear as ministers of righteousness. So the devil has ministers and they could be the angels, the aggeloi, which means messengers. So we have only allusions to them in various ways in various contexts. We don't have an explanation given, which means I'm not going to either. Now, you did ask something that I have maybe even more interest in: Can a Christian be inhabited by a demon? Once again, the Bible does not say yes or no directly about that. Most Christians I've met hold a view that demons cannot possess Christians, and I think they do so not so much on any direct statement of Scripture so much as their intuitions. They say, "Well, the Bible does say that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit." Now, that's the Bible does say that, though it doesn't say anything about demon possession there. But they say, "Well, if our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, then a devil a demon can't live in there too." Well, that's a nice thought, I mean it's more sentimental than logical. I mean there's nothing in the Bible that says that the Holy Spirit can only live in your body with forces and influences that are positive. Because after all, Paul said in Galatians that the flesh wars against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, and these two are contrary to each other. These are two influences or forces inside of us. So, the Holy Spirit can live in us and does. That doesn't mean that everything else in us is quite amenable to him. Our flesh is not, demons would not be if they happen to be there, but we're not told whether they could be there. But the idea that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit is one of the main arguments that people use to say that a Christian can't be possessed by demons. Well, that may be true, because the Bible doesn't come out and say that Christians can be. There are some various things in the Bible that make me wonder whether Christians can be or not, but I just don't know. My approach to that whole question is: I don't have to know whether Christians can be possessed by demons or not. If I encounter a person who seems to be a Christian and seems to be possessed by demons, I'm going to go ahead and deal with it as if it is a demon. If I'm wrong, no harm, no foul. If it is a demon, then that's the only kind of help they can get. Now, it's also possible that somebody who seems to be a Christian isn't a Christian. So when you meet somebody who seems to be a Christian and seems to have a demon, there's two things you could say about them. It's one person: Either they're a Christian or they're not, and they either have a demon or they don't. Those are some variables. If a person who appears to be a Christian is one, and if they appear to have a demon and they do, then that would answer the question for us. But there's other possibilities. They could be not a real Christian who either does or does not have a demon. They could have a demon or they could not have a demon, and we could be mistaken about that. All I can say is the Bible doesn't lay out the answers to those questions so much as it just tells us that we have power over the demons. We don't have to know everything about them, and like I said, if we encounter demons, we should deal with them as demons. And if we happen to have a doctrine that says Christians can't have demons, and we find someone who's demonized and we say, "Oh, I can't help them with that because they're a Christian, they don't have a demon," we might be doing them a disservice. The Bible does not tell us directly those things. So I'm going to have to leave it at that. We've got some more questions coming from other callers. Keith in Battleground, Washington. Welcome to the Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
Keith: Thank you, Steve. In a previous call, you had stated that even though Scripture does not state that baptism is symbolic, you do believe that Scripture does teach that baptism is just symbolic and that baptism does not actually do anything. And you suggested that I listen to your recorded messages titled "Baptisms" to get your reasoning. And I've got one question there, but I wondered if I before I asked the question if I could try to summarize your reasons to make sure I understand your teaching, or would you prefer me to ask the question?
Steve Gregg: Well, it depends on how long it'd take you to summarize it. Why don't you ask the question first and then we'll see if we need to summarize my teaching or not.
Keith: Okay. So my question is, and it's going to be regarding Mark 16. If we are to trust in the Lord with all our heart and lean not on our own understanding, and if Jesus will be the final judge of who will be saved, then in Mark 16 when Jesus told His disciples to proclaim the clear and simple gospel message that whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, shouldn't we fully believe what Jesus said and then read and understand the conversion accounts in Acts in the light of that clearly and simply stated gospel message, rather than using the conversion accounts as reasoning to possibly change the message that Jesus gave?
Steve Gregg: Okay, I'll be glad to answer that and then we can take your next point. Yeah. First of all, there's a number of aspects here. Mark 16, most Bible scholars do not believe that those verses in Mark 16 actually are part of Mark or that Jesus really said them. You know the manuscript evidence is strongly opposed—at least many people feel—to that being an authentic passage, the last 12 verses of Mark, including that verse, are not considered to be in the original by most scholars. They could be wrong, but it raises questions since the oldest manuscripts don't contain them. Now, let me just say I'm willing to say they are authentic. I'm just saying there's an awful lot of scholars who would differ with that. Now, Jesus didn't say that the gospel is to believe and to be baptized. The gospel is the good news. He says preach the gospel to every creature, whoever believes—that is whoever believes the gospel—and is baptized will be saved. I believe that. I believe anyone who believes the gospel and is baptized is saved truly. Now, he didn't say that baptism is part of the gospel message, though it could be. Whatever the gospel is is what we have to believe. And the person who believes and is baptized is saved, truly. Now the question is about what about somebody who believes and isn't baptized? That's the issue. Jesus didn't say whoever believes and isn't baptized won't be saved. He just said whoever does not believe will not be saved. He said in the same passage. So whoever believes and is baptized shall be saved, whoever doesn't believe will be damned. So he doesn't say whoever doesn't get baptized will be damned. So that's he's not necessarily saying that baptism is what saves a person, as you're suggesting. Now, I if you understand me correctly, you'll know that I say baptism is required. Baptism is commanded. We're not at liberty to ignore the commands of Jesus Christ if we're His followers, we obey them. But if you listen to my lectures, you know there are people who do commit themselves to following Christ and for whatever reason—they don't have a Bible, let us say, or maybe the person who evangelized them did a bad job of it—they've never heard that they're required to be baptized. I mean, believers are told to be baptized. Do all believers know that they're told to be baptized? Probably not. I've met people who didn't know that. And so the question is, they believe in Christ, they're devoted followers of His, but no one ever told them that they need to be baptized and they don't. And you know if you're going to say, "Well, they can't be saved then," I'm going to just have to say I don't think that's what the Bible tells us.
Keith: Yeah, so I guess I was thinking more along the lines of looking at it from the standpoint of Jesus is saying what saves you and then He's saying what condemns you. So he's obviously not saying lack of baptism condemns you. He's saying lack of faith or lack of believing condemns you. But one of the principles of reading Scripture that I was taught is that we use the clearly and simply stated Scriptures to use as benchmarks when we're reading other portions of Scripture. Sure, and it seems to me that when He said, "If you believe and are baptized you will be saved," it would match and we apply that to your reasoning that everything associated with the conversion experience occurs before you're saved, then baptism would be included in the conversion experience based upon literally believing what Jesus said.
Steve Gregg: No, there's many people who are in heaven today, I believe, who were never baptized, including Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Moses, the prophets, John the Baptist, the thief on the cross.
Keith: Yeah, okay. So I agree 100% with you there.
Steve Gregg: Okay. But many people will say they're a different category because they all lived and died before Jesus died and rose again. So what they're implying is it was easier to get saved before Jesus came than it is now, because in those days, Abraham could just believe in the Lord and it was counted to him for righteousness. But now you can't just believe in the Lord and it won't be counted to you for righteousness, you have to believe in the Lord and be baptized, which is not always going to be easy for people. There's a lot of people in the Middle East who lived in desert areas—all over the world there's people who live in desert areas—not the easiest thing to find water to be dipped in. Or frankly, I've had people call me and say, "I want to get baptized, where can I go?" And you know they don't live where I live, I don't know anyone who can baptize them. I could say, "You go to a church and they'll baptize you," but usually modern churches won't baptize you unless you join their church. So I think here's people who want to be baptized and they're in a situation they can't find any place to do it. Now, you know it'd be a very strange God to say, "I want to save everybody, but if people just don't have the opportunity to be baptized, even if they love me and believe me, sorry I can't save you man, this this water's what does the trick." If the water does the trick now, it seems like people who were saved in the Old Testament would have required the same water to do the trick. The trick is a relationship with God and a relationship with God is entered and maintained by faith and obedient faith. And so that's what saves a person. Now, if a person is evangelized properly—and by the way, the people who wrote the Bible didn't know anyone who wasn't—but we do, we know people who have not been evangelized properly. If someone's been evangelized properly, then then they will be baptized because they'll be told that that's required and the person who evangelized them will do it. We see that in the book of Acts throughout. And I dare say I don't think there were any unbaptized Christians in you know the first century church. So I mean I'm not sure what's difficult about understanding that. Or if it's just are you part of the Church of Christ?
Keith: No.
Steve Gregg: Okay, because they would say—
Keith: I'm Lutheran.
Steve Gregg: Yeah, they would say water baptism's essential for salvation. But yeah.
Keith: They would say that, but they also I think also acknowledge as you've just said that there are exceptions, and they would certainly include the thief on the cross and all these people that—
Steve Gregg: Some of them do. Yeah, some of them do. Yeah. All right, well hey, I got to take a break now but those are my answers to your questions, I appreciate your call. I have a half hour more, but I have a break I take at this point to let you know the Narrow Path is a listener-supported ministry. It costs us a lot of money, doesn't cost you anything to listen. It costs us lately it's been about $150,000 a month. $150,000 a month is what we're paying radio stations so you can hear it for free. Yet we don't sell anything, we don't fundraise, we don't do anything of that, we just let you know. You can help us out if you want to, you can go to our website thenarrowpath.com or you can write to us at the Narrow Path, PO Box 1730, Temecula, California 92593 if you'd like to. I'll be back in 30 seconds, don't go away. Welcome back to the Narrow Path radio broadcast. My name is Steve Gregg and we're live for another half hour taking your calls. The number to call is 844-484-5737. Once again, we have a couple of lines open on our switchboard, it's a good time for you to get through if you hope to do so before this half hour ends. 844-484-5737 is the number. All right, we're going to talk to Liz in Louisiana next. Hi, Liz, welcome to the Narrow Path.
Liz: Hello, Mr. Gregg. It's a pleasure to finally speak to you. I really appreciate all that you do. I've not been following your work very long yet, so I hope you don't mind if my question is one you've been asked many times before. So my question is, how do we know practically speaking what God's will is for each of us individually regarding specific life choices that the Bible is silent on? Like for instance, what career we're supposed to choose, or whether or not I should pick up a hitchhiker I see on the side of the road, or which need or charity I should give my money to, and so on. If we have the feeling that God is telling us to make a certain choice, how do we know it's actually God telling us and not ourselves or something else like influence of other people or media or demons or something?
Steve Gregg: Well, that that's always an issue, isn't it? I mean, things suggest themselves to our minds and we want to know, is that something from God or is that just something from me or from some other source? And the answer is there's not some kind of a way that we always know, but there's many ways we can test. I would say this first of all, that my view of divine guidance is not that God is telling you what to do in every detail of life and circumstance. Basically, let's take how God guided people in the Old Testament and then we'll bring it up to our time. In the Old Testament, God gave His laws and all the Jews were to know the laws and to live by the laws. And you know, but what did the law require? Well, you don't kill anyone, you don't commit adultery, you don't steal, you don't hurt people, you love your neighbor as yourself. And and then what do you do the rest of the time? Well, three times a year you go to Jerusalem and offer these sacrifices. Okay, but what about the rest of the time? Well, the rest of the time you you plow your field, you know, you plant your seeds, you harvest, you take care of your kids, you keep the house, you know. In other words, they did the same things everybody else did, except that they were bound by God's ways expressed in His laws. So the pagans would go out and they'd worship idols. Israel couldn't do that. Pagans would sometimes murder or steal or commit adultery. Israel was not allowed to do that. But much of the time, they were doing a lot of the same kinds of things everyone else was, because being a Christian isn't just being a religious person who's always doing religious things. Being a Christian means, well like it says, whatsoever you do in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, in Colossians chapter 3. And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10, whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God. Okay, so eating and drinking, whatever you do, whatever you say, you do those things for the glory of God. You do them in the way that you believe glorifies God. Well, how would you know what glorifies God? Well, much of that is simply found in the teaching of Jesus and the teaching of the New Testament in general. You love your neighbor, you do good, and so forth. Now, as far as specific instances of doing good, like picking up a particular hitchhiker or giving money to a certain beggar. You know, God might lay it in somebody's heart in a particular situation, say, "This is important, pick that person up," you know. Or you might be the kind of person who always picks people up, and sometimes it'll be an important encounter, sometimes it will not. You might be the kind of person who gives to all the homeless people, but the Bible doesn't say you have to give to every homeless person or pick up every hitchhiker. But I would say that in those kinds of decisions, unless someone has an extremely strong urge that they are pretty sure is from God and you know, I guess if you're not sure, you say I don't know if it's God, then maybe it isn't. Because for example, for a woman to pick up hitchhikers, that's a pretty dangerous thing to do. Now, there might be rare occasions where God would have somebody do that, but they'd better let them know pretty powerfully because in general, one way that we know the will of God is that God says He wants us to be wise. I mean, the whole book of Proverbs indicates that wisdom is God's voice to a person giving them instruction. You know, Jesus said, "You want to be wise and build your house on a rock." Paul said, "Do not be unwise but understand what the will of the Lord is." Wisdom is something that God gives us. He didn't give the animals the same thing. It's rationality, we think things through. When it comes to stewarding money, for example, to give money to a certain charity. Well, I mean, sometimes I give because to somebody I like what they're doing, and I'm not 100% sure if they're doing it well, or if they're stewarding the money I give them well, but I don't know any other way to give to that kind of a need than to go through one of these organizations. If I can find out, if I can do research on them and find out that they're trustworthy, I feel a lot better about giving to them. If I don't know, and if I don't know how to find out, sometimes I'll give to them and just say, "God, you know what I'm giving this in your name, I hope this glorifies you." When it comes to picking up hitchhikers, I've picked up hitchhikers before—this was usually back in the 70s, not modern times, because there weren't as many psychopaths out back then. And you know one hitchhiker that I picked up, I and two other Christians picked up this hitchhiker in Denver and we led him to the Lord and he became a Calvary Chapel pastor in Connecticut and and later a Vineyard pastor then back to Calvary again, but he's served the Lord you know for 50 years I think. And you know he was a hippie drug dealer when we picked him up and we might have said "Oh we shouldn't pick him up," but we felt like we should and that was a good thing. But how do we know? How do we know if that's going to be a good thing or not? I would just say if you have any doubts and and it would otherwise seem unwise to do it, don't do it, you know. Go by wisdom and the only time you should do something that doesn't seem wise is if you've got no doubt in your mind that God is telling you to do it. Now, how does He do that? Well, you might have dreams or visions or an angel might appear and tell you to do it, or there just might be such a a nagging in your in your spirit that God is not going to let you off the hook about this, you know. The main thing is to learn not to be a legalistic person, because then you might you might do a whole bunch of things that you think God's requiring you to do out of fear of a legalistic kind of fear. I think you just need to walk with God, just like you walk with a friend or a husband or something like that, and trust that He's going to let you know what He wants you to do. And if He hasn't given you any special instructions, just go out and plow the field or go out and give to a charity that seems like they're doing the right thing or pick up a hitchhiker or don't, depending on how safe it seems or doesn't seem. I think in general for women to pick up male hitchhikers is not a good thing, it's just not wise. Sometimes for men to pick up hitchhikers is not wise. So yeah, there's not some kind of a formula that you say, "Okay, here's something that came to my mind to do, I wonder if that's God or not." There's not like a three-point test to figure it out. You just have to learn to walk with God, walk in wisdom, walk according to His Word, and respond if He puts something very strongly on your heart that He's not letting you off the hook about.
Liz: Thank you, I think that makes a lot of sense. I appreciate it.
Steve Gregg: You know, I was hitchhiking once back in the 70s and everyone was going by, no one was stopping. I looked like a hippie back then and so a lot of people didn't want to pick me up. And some women, I think one woman or a woman and a man, went by and ignored me. And then a few minutes later, they came back and picked me up. And they said, "We passed you up but we just felt like God was telling us to come back and pick you up," so He didn't let them off the hook. But they had a pickup truck and I was able to ride in the back. That's safer when you pick up a hitchhiker if you're driving a pickup truck, put them in the back. Anyway, yeah, there's not a simple answer that fits all cases, but learning to walk with God, learning to be responsive to the Spirit of God's convictions and learning how to apply the teachings of Jesus in practical life, those are all part of what it means to learn to walk with God and follow God.
Liz: Thank you so much. This is really helpful.
Steve Gregg: Okay, Liz, God bless you. Thanks for your call. All right, we're going to talk next to Neon in Paramount, California. Neon, welcome.
Neon: Hi, Steve. About demons, I think demons are very powerful because they don't feel pain. They don't feel pain and they just want to possess bodies. And I have a question, really quick question. Exorcism. Who can do exorcism? Can somebody have a career as an exorcist?
Steve Gregg: Well, there are people who have kind of a career as exorcists. Some of them are in the Roman Catholic Church—a special branch of their priesthood is trained to be exorcists. I don't know if they keep busy full-time or not. I imagine these days they probably can. I'm not a Catholic and therefore I believe that any Christian who's walking with God, who has the faith to do it, who's you know doesn't have any dirty laundry that the demon's going to throw in their face, should feel free and feel unintimidated about facing demons. I think that the demon-possessed cases and exorcisms that are in movies like the movie "The Exorcist" and there's other movies that have exorcisms—"The Exorcism of Emily Rose" and stuff like that—they always of course have the most scary kinds of situations and they always have Catholic exorcists. And the Catholic exorcists don't do things the way Jesus did. They sprinkle holy water and wave a crucifix and say the Hail Marys and stuff. Sometimes I think they succeed despite that, but that's not how demons are cast out in the Bible. If somebody is a follower of Christ and possesses the Holy Spirit and and God has put them in a situation where they're the one that's needed to cast out the demon, I believe they can do so in the name of Jesus. They don't need any holy water or crucifixes or any of that. Just in the Bible, Paul would say, "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out," and they did. The first time I ever cast a demon out of anyone—and I don't want to make it sound like I've done it a lot, I have not, I've only done it a very few times—but the first time I did, I was only 19 years old. And I didn't know what to do, but somebody who was obviously demon-possessed came to me, was brought to me. I would have been happier if they'd brought her to someone else because I didn't know what I was doing and I'd never encountered a demon-possessed person to my knowledge before that. And I just had to scan my brain to see what did Jesus do, what did the apostles do, and I just did that and and I will say this, I had heard like missionaries and stuff talk about exorcisms so I remembered a few things maybe that they'd said. But basically I just kind of did what the Bible says and and this woman was delivered fully and radically and dramatically. But I don't have a lot of experience with this. I have I have certainly confronted demon-possessed people before and the demons didn't come out for whatever reason. I believe there's a couple of things I deduce from Scripture that might explain why in some cases they won't or don't come out. One is that the person wants it in there. I can't throw a demon out of somebody else if they have invited it in and they want it in. And some do. Some demon-possessed people have supernatural powers, they can read fortunes, they know they're psychics and so forth, and they like that. So they don't want to get rid of the demon. And if the patient you know is welcoming the demon, I as an outsider can't make it go away, and even Jesus won't make it against the will of the person who's who's rejecting deliverance. Another case that it may not go out is—and I don't know if this is true or not, I'm just this is just from biblical data, not from biblical teaching. The Bible doesn't teach what I'm about to say, but the biblical data does illustrate it, and that is every time an exorcism took place in the Bible from Jesus or the apostles, the demons were manifesting themselves. Now, what I mean by that is in the Bible sometimes people behave more or less normally except on occasions when the demons begin to act up. Now, when the demons begin to act up, the person who's manifesting the demon is doing all kinds of crazy things many times. Saying crazy things—they're wild, sometimes they're violent. But the same person when the demon isn't manifesting, I believe the demon's still in there but I think it just submerges itself and goes deep and it's not showing until another occasion. Many times when Jesus met demon-possessed people, not every time, but the demons acted up because they were now in the presence of Jesus, or they heard Jesus preaching and it stirred them up and made them manifest. But it's interesting Jesus never cast out the demons before they started manifesting. And I don't know the reason for that. It may be—and this is strictly a theory, I have no authority on this except from examples—it may be that when the demon is manifesting, that's when it has come to the surface more and is most vulnerable to being removed. And when it's not manifesting, maybe it's hiding deep down inside where it's more entrenched until the next time. I do not know, I don't want anyone to teach that as doctrine. But I believe, except in certain cases, any Christian can cast demons out of people, but they do have to have faith, they have to be walking I think in the authority of Christ, that is to say they're not compromising. If you're compromising in your spiritual life and you confront a demon, unfortunately a lot of times they know you are, even if no one else does. And demons have been known to call out a minister or somebody else about some secret sin in his life because he was trying to cast them out and they knew it and no one else did. So make sure you live with clean hands and a pure heart and you're ready at all times to encounter that kind of thing. And that being so, it doesn't take a special class of people or special ordained group to cast out demons, which is of course what your question was about. All right, let's talk next to Ray in Vancouver, BC. Hi, Ray, welcome.
Ray: Hello? Hey, first-time caller, very nervous. I have a huge problem. I'm new to the faith, very new, and have a horrible drug habit. I don't go to church, it's hard to read the Bible. I'm just giving you the point because I could go on forever. I talked to a pastor the other day through a friend of mine, he said he's going to pray about it and get back to me. I listen to your show, love it, I just wanted to see if you had any words of wisdom.
Steve Gregg: Right. Well, you say you have a big drug problem. Does that mean that you simply abuse drugs, are you addicted to drugs? How would you describe are you an addict?
Ray: Absolutely. But I still manage to go to work and what not.
Steve Gregg: Okay. Well, let me say this: I have known many people who were drug addicts and and God delivered them. Sometimes it happened just when they got saved. I've known people who were heroin addicts and when they got saved, they just went off heroin and no you know they just went cold turkey didn't have any problems with it after that. But on the other hand, I've known people who struggle with alcohol and even something like cigarettes or or drug addictions who struggle with it after they become Christians. I cannot announce I cannot say because I don't know why God heals some people of sicknesses right away, why sometimes he it's a gradual process. I believe that God has kind of a different plan and program for every person, He has a personal relationship with each of us and therefore He's got a plan in if He's going to heal you, He could do it right away, He could do it over time, or He might not in the case of sickness, the Bible doesn't always indicate that He's going to heal that at all. Now, drug addiction of course is a behavior and not a sickness, though it could it certainly can have a physiological aspect. Even even alcoholism has a physiological aspect which you can see by people going through withdrawals when they when they come off or DTs for alcohol. But yeah, God can deliver you from that without any withdrawal. But there's not a guarantee anywhere in Scripture that He'll do that in every case. All I can say by way of encouragement, I have known people that that's happened to. I've also known people it didn't happen to that way and they had to fight it off just like any other sin in in life. And you know I would say if if you really have a physical addiction to hard drugs and and if God doesn't deliver you—that is if He doesn't do it immediately—then then you have a responsibility to take whatever measures are necessary to make sure you stop doing it. Because taking the drugs is a sin. Of course, the Bible says that all people are slaves of sin until they until they get saved, but not all people who are slaves of sin are drug addicts. An addict definitely is a slave to that until he's set free. And so I would say you probably look into detox, some kind of rehab program. I I would suggest for a person with drug problems to get in touch with Teen Challenge. Lots of rehab programs are not Christian, but Teen Challenge is and they've had tremendous success with drug addicts, in fact their success rate is huge compared to secular programs. They're very much depend on God and the power of the Holy Spirit and and lots of people have been helped through Teen Challenge. There's other Christian ministries like that too. Now, so what I would say is you know ask God to deliver you and then just endeavor to not take drugs anymore. But if after doing so, it turns out that you're not delivered and you're still taking drugs and you can't stop, then I'd say go for go into some kind of a program. But of course success is not through a program per se, success is by walking in the Spirit. Paul said if we walk in the Spirit, we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. And and drug use is one of the lusts of the flesh that he mentions. So if we're walking in the Spirit, we won't be getting high. And therefore learning to walk in the Spirit is really what it comes down to. But if you're not doing that well enough, you still have to not get high. So I mean I'd say I'd say find a Christian program if you can. I don't know if Teen Challenge is you know is where you are, you're in Vancouver, BC, but they're all over the place and I would check into that. But also any other Christian you know drug rehab would be good to look into. Now, if you weren't an addict, if you just like an occasional abuser of weed or something like that, I would just kind of give you the same counsel I'd give to someone who's having trouble with porn or with with alcohol or with some other sin, anger, you know. But if you're really an addict, you really need to either get full deliverance supernaturally or since that's not guaranteed all the time, you could need to do something else to get over that habit. And if you've given your life to the Lord now, then you've made a determination to get over the habit. And I'd just say you need to do whatever you can to do that. Praying all the time because God could God could deliver you at any time. If He hasn't yet, it doesn't mean He won't tomorrow or next week, but while you're praying, you need to be behaving too. And so you know you may need a program for that. I I don't know anything else to say.
Ray: Definitely not behaving, but Steve, love your show truly, thank you for the advice.
Steve Gregg: Thank you, Ray, for calling and now we have a lot of people around the country who are probably going to be praying for your success, I'm sure, I'm sure of it. Thanks for calling, brother. All right, let's let's talk next to Dave in Iowa. Hi, Dave, welcome.
Dave: Hello. Hi. Yeah, so on the radio you were talking about the need of baptism. And people in dry areas, if they really want to give their lives to Christ, they're going to find a way to get to a source of water.
Steve Gregg: You're right, you are, but if one's not very much available yet and you're looking for one—I mean, you could of course just pour water over your head. If you have enough water to drink, you could pour it over your head, but that's not that's not the way baptism was done in the Bible, but it would at least be showing good faith that you want to be baptized. But again, even if there's plenty of water, you have to have someone who'll do it for you. And people who are members of churches do not realize how difficult that is for someone who gets converted not in a church. If you let's just say you you're reading a Gideon Bible in your hotel room and you say I'm going to follow Jesus now. Okay, well you don't go up to the the desk clerk in the lobby and say Would you baptize me here? You need to find somebody who's a Christian who will do that. And not every Christian will, although perhaps they should all be willing to if they can. And not even all pastors will unless you're going to join their church. And joining their church is certainly not what it means to become a Christian. So it is there are people who want to be baptized who have had a hard time finding a way to do that. So all I'm saying I'm not trying to make excuses for people who live in the desert. You're right, if they can find enough water to drink, they can probably find enough water to pour over their head, though that's not technically what baptism is. But it could one could say, "God, this is all the water I've got, so let this be my baptism." I appreciate your call. Joe in Calhoun, Georgia. Welcome to the Narrow Path. Thanks for calling.
Joe: Hey, Steve. I have a nephew that was recently diagnosed with Tourette's. And some of the family members, an uncle in particular, wants to do an anointing and he's got a couple pastors involved. There's a little hesitation from the boy's parents and they asked my opinion and I just thought I would call and see what you thought about it.
Steve Gregg: Yeah, well, unfortunately Tourette's is a very confusing thing. Obviously, you know, it's considered a mental illness. It's actually a behavior. Now, whether the behavior is caused by a mental illness or caused by just bad character or caused by demons or something else, it's hard to say. I mean, I would say there's nothing wrong with anointing him with oil. It says that in James chapter 5, is any sick, let him call for the elders of the church, let them anoint him with oil. I'd say that'd be one way to go. Now, as I said, if it's a sickness, it's one thing. If it's just bad behavior, it's another. And nobody can see inside the brain of another person, and all a psychologist can do is basically give an opinion about the behavior and what its cause is. And that's why it's so hard to give any kind of answer to that. But yeah, praying for them certainly is not the wrong thing to do. And since I'm sorry I'm out of time I can't really explore other options right now. I apologize for that. You've been listening to the Narrow Path, my name is Steve Gregg. Our website is thenarrowpath.com. Thanks for joining us.