The Talisman!

THERE'S MORE THAN SUPERSTITION TO TALISMANS! That's why the Lord didn't like gods and goddesses in graven images, because the evil spirit frequently accompanied the graven image. Any kind of talisman, an idol is a talisman, it's a picture, a token of something.

A LOT OF THESE PEOPLE WEAR A TOOTH, have you ever wondered why that is? It comes from an age-old custom of wearing one of the Devil's horns to protect you from the Devil! "Okay Devil, I already belong to you, now don't bother me." A lot of people do that.

DID YOU EVER SEE ONE OF THOSE HORNS HANGING ON A NECKLACE? It's one of the commonest kinds of neckpieces. the funniest part about it, I have seen Madonna medallions hanging right next to the horn on the same chain around the same neck! They want God and the Devil both to protect them! Well, I'll tell you, it's not funny, because there is something to animism!

MODERN CIVILISED MAN HAS SAID THAT THE SAVAGES OF THE JUNGLES and THEIR ANIMISM IS ALL PURE SUPERSTITION, but if you've ever watched a yogi levitate, you'll know it's not superstition! Or if you've ever watched a yogi's little boy climb a rope that's just flung straight up in the air and stands there, then you know it's not superstition!

You've heard of what animism is? They worship all kinds of inanimate objects--everything from dolls and voodoo dolls and graven images and idols, even pictures, to talismans or trees or stones or sticks or anything. And there's more to Druidism too than modern man's willing to admit.

THE DRUIDS WERE A VERY FLOURISHING RELIGION FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS, still are in some places. Common people think Druidism is the worship of trees, but it is the worship of the spirits that have inhabited or possessed the trees!

ANIMISM IS PROBABLY THE WORLD'S MOST WIDESPREAD RELIGION. Druidism is just another form of animism. Any kind of religion in which they worship inanimate objects, trees, stones, images, the general classification for all of them, the worship of spirits that are supposed to inhabit these objects, these things, is generally known as animism.

WHY THEY CALL IT ANIMISM, I DON'T KNOW! -- THEY ARE INANIMATE OBJECTS, THEY'RE NOT ANIMATE. Inanimate means it doesn't move, animate means it moves, has life. Maybe that's where they got the idea, that the objects did move sometimes! It's the World's largest religion because it encompasses a whole lot of different religions. It encompasses most of the African and Oriental religions.

IT'S THE THING WHICH GOD ATTACKED ALMOST THE MOST, the thing He hated the most outside of hypocrisy and self-righteousness, which is self-worship, was the worship of things, idolatry. It's idolatry. That's what's so horrible about all these new African decorations that are becoming so popular, I wouldn't want one in my house, I'll tell you!

I TOLD YOU THAT STORY ABOUT THE BUDDHA THAT MY MOTHER PRAYED AGAINST. This doctor brought it back from Japan and had it in his garden. My Mother was horrified and said, "How could you have this idol here, you're a Christian!" "Oh," he said, "that's no idol, it's just a souvenir, a very beautiful work of art that I brought back with me from Japan, it doesn't mean a thing to me except it cost me a lot of money, it's beautiful, look at it!--Gorgeous ceramic!"

SHE SAID, "IT'S AN IDOL, IT'S AN IMAGE, and I THINK IT'S A BAD TESTIMONY for a Christian to have a Buddhist image idol in your garden! I'm going to pray against it, I think you ought to take it out!" And that Scripture came to her, "Like the god Dagon in the temple of the Philistines, God will destroy it." Next morning the thing had fallen off its pedestal and fallen to the ground and broken off its head! That ought to show you God doesn't like them!

THAT'S LARGELY THE PRINCIPLE OF ANIMISM, THEY TRY TO WORSHIP ALL THE GODS and all the devils and all the demons so that they'll all stay away and won't bother them. But it's obvious, of course, they bother them plenty!

BELOVED, WE ARE IN A WAR! We're not fighting against animate or inanimate objects. The Apostle says we're fighting against wicked spirits of the Spirit World, this is the literal translation of what that nice old English means. "We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this World, against spiritual wickedness in high places," or Heavenly places. Another translation is heavenly, meaning the Spirit World. (Eph.6;12.)

HIGH PLACES. PRINCIPALITIES and POWERS. They often name a local city government a principality. It comes from the word "prince," some prince ruled that area. So if there are wicked princes in the Spirit World, demon princes, they have principalities. They have certain areas that they rule--doesn't it say rulers of the wickedness of this World?

THE DEVIL HAS HIS ORGANISATION TOO, and it's probably a lot better organised than man's. Virtually every square inch of this Earth is ruled by some man or some government, and they've got it all divided up, borders and countries and provinces and States and counties and all kinds of things; cantons, parishes, cities, principalities and municipalities.

WELL, THAT'S HOW THE DEVIL'S KINGDOM IS ORGANISED TOO--principalities powers ruled by wicked spirits, think of that. The Devil is pretty practical too, but so is the Lord, thank the Lord, He has His princes who are also ruling and more powerful, but right now Satan's devils are allowed to do battle with'm!

THE PRINCE OF PERSIA HAD A BATTLE WITH THE ARCHANGEL MICHAEL while Michael was trying to come give Daniel a message. (Dan.10:13.) That Prince of Persia was not the King of Persia, that was somebody else. The Prince was a Demon Prince who was in charge of the country of Persia. So, the Devil's well organised, you can tell that by the way he works, but the Lord is better organised, thank the Lord!

"THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH" (Rom.1:17), that's a good one, huh? faith in what?--The Lord! What kind of a God do we have? What is the basic and the major difference between our God and the gods of this World? He's love, that's good, but I'm speaking more along the lines of physical, material characteristics. He is a Spirit and therefore is He usually seen or unseen? Unseen. (Jn.4:24; 1Co.6:17; 2Co.3:17; 4:18.)

ALTHOUGH THERE ARE WICKED SPIRITS BEHIND WHAT THE WORLD WORSHIPS, the World itself worships mostly the things that can be seen. Materialism is really the major religion of the World, and animism is just a form of materialism, the worship of things. Modern man worships things too, he worships his house and his car and his television and his wife and his money and all kinds of inanimate objects, so he's just as much an animist as the savages in the jungles of Africa! What's the difference?

OUR GOD IS THE GOD OF LOVE! The Devil is literally the god of hate! But as far as the other characteristics of God, the most outstanding thing about our God and what the World can't understand is He can't be seen. We worship the unseen God.

"NO MAN HATH SEEN GOD AT ANY TIME and LIVED," he couldn't live and see God in this body. Some of the prophets fell down sick just from seeing angels, and John from seeing the Lord Jesus who does have a body. Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! Thank you Lord! So we worship God how? Yes, in the Spirit, by what? By faith.

IN OTHER WORDS, WE WORSHIP A GOD WHO IS NOT EVEN SEEN EXCEPT IN YOU. We can't prove Him to the World, can't prove Him to anybody except in us, that's all. We worship the Unseen God, and that is totally the exact opposite from what all the rest of the World worships today and has always worshipped.

THE WORLD HAS ALWAYS WORSHIPPED SOME KIND OF SEEN GODS, even manifestations, materialisations of spiritual gods, as in all those stories of mythology and all that stuff. All that stuff probably did go on at some time or other in the past, although I think some are pretty wild tales that probably got a little bit exaggerated and embellished as it went along.

SO WHAT IS IT THAT GOD HELD AGAINST MAN? Read it, Romans 1:18,19: "For the wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness. Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them."

IT SAYS HE'S INVISIBLE, BUT IT SAYS THAT YOU CAN SEE EVIDENCE OF HIS EXISTENCE, IT'S MANIFEST. All you have to do is look around at the World and see His handiwork. His creation proves His existence. That's why the Devil has evolution as the cornerstone of his doctrine, and his major place of attack is Creation, because it's the greatest living proof that God exists!

THE DEVIL HAD TO CREATE EVOLUTION TO TRY TO DENY THE CREATION OF GOD. Because everything about the creation, everything in creation proves God exists, everything! It's perfection, it's organisation, it's synchronisation, it's harmony, it's unity, it's balance in ecology--everything!

LIKE DR. MILLIKAN SAID, "IF YOU SAY THAT THIS WATCH JUST PUT ITSELF TOGETHER, INVENTED ITSELF, YOU'RE CRAZY! Just like behind the synchronised perfection, order of every watch, there had to be a watchmaker, behind the perfect synchronised perfection of the Universe there had to be a Creator!"

IT REMINDS ME OF THAT OTHER STORY ABOUT THE CHRISTIAN BUSINESSMAN WHO HAD A COMPANY THAT MADE MEAT GRINDERS. That's a big business, food processing. Some sceptic was making fun of his faith because he was a Christian, believed in God, and said: "Ah, it all just happened by accident!"

HE SAID, "WELL, LOOK AT THE WORLD AROUND YOU, THAT PROVES THERE'S A GOD!" The guy said, "Ah, it all just happened by accident! All the materials were there floating around through space and they just happened to run into each other and put themselves together." He said, "Listen buddy, even if you had all the parts to one of my meat grinders, you could put them into a washtub and shake them up from now until doomsday and you'd never make a meat grinder! Somebody's got to put it together!"

"FOR THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF HIM FROM THE CREATION OF THE WORLD ARE CLEARLY SEEN." The wording here is a little difficult, if I had been translating I think I would have made it a little simpler. What it really is saying, is that His invisibility, His invisible existence, is manifest or proven by the things you can see, His Creation. The existence of our invisible God is proven by the visible creation, get it? That's what that's saying.

"For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the World are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse." (Romans 1:20)

THE WORLD'S WITHOUT EXCUSE BECAUSE THEY CAN JUST LOOK AROUND and SEE THE CREATION.

MAN WITH ALL HIS SMART-ALECKYNESS HAS NEVER BEEN ABLE TO CREATE ONE LIVING CELL, has never been able to create anything alive, really, nothing! He's created all kinds of imitations and machinery and engines, nearly all of which are destructive, potentially destructive.

ONLY GOD'S CREATION IS ALIVE, REPRODUCTIVE and SELF-REPAIRING, and about the longest-lived machine in the World is the human body. There's no other machinery that can last as long as the human body, because machinery doesn't repair itself continually. Every seven years you have an entirely completely totally new body, not one cell left from the old model. Think of that!

"EVEN ONE LITTLE CELL IS BEYOND MAN'S COMPREHENSION," as quoted Dr. Steiner, obviously German-Jewish, considered the World's greatest authority on the living human cell and famous for his faith also. After studying it for 30 years somebody asked him something about it and he said, "After 30 years of study of the human cell I cannot help but marvel at the Divine Designer who made it!"

THAT'S TRUE SCIENCE, THEY ACKNOWLEDGE THE EXISTENCE OF GOD, they know there's Something, Somebody, some Planner, some Designer. The only ones who don't are the oppositions of science falsely so called. "The vain and the profane babblings," Timothy says, "of science falsely so-called." (Tim.6:20.)

WHAT PROVES THE EXISTENCE OF GOD'S CREATION? The greatest proof that Paul gives here that God exists is His Creation! So the Devil had to attack that fundamentally and try to make people believe it just happened by accident. When it so obviously had this certain pattern or design to it, they couldn't then say it was totally accidental, so they created the doctrine of "natural selection." In other words, yes, there's a design to nature, as they call it, it not only creates itself, but it designs itself by what they call the process of natural selection.

IN OTHER WORDS, IF YOU THINK ABOUT IT LONG ENOUGH and YOU LIKE TO CLIMB TREES like I did when I was a boy, after a few million years, thousands of generations, you might grow a prehensile tail that would help you hold on to the branches, evolution in reverse. Well, the funny part about it is, it can't come in only one generation, you've got to have thousands of generations with the same desire and this same will power and power of positive thinking to think yourself a tail!

I'VE TOLD YOU MY LITTLE STORY OF CREATION ABOUT HOW EVOLUTIONARY SCIENCE TELLS US IT ALL BEGAN WITH ONE LITTLE LIVING CELL floating around in the sea, and it got tired of floating, it wanted to swim. So several thousand generations cells concentrated on growing a tail that it could wiggle and paddle itself around with and swim. It took millions of years, of course, they even tell you exactly how many million years. Well, it's pretty hard to prove that it didn't take that many million years because you weren't there.

BUT AS ONE GEOLOGIST SAID AT GRAND CANYON, DR. CHRISTENSEN--they had about six geologists there--he got up one day and he said, "Listen, these geologists tell you that that certain strata of rock is so many million years of age, and that rock is so many million years old. You just ask him, 'Vas you dere, Charlie?' They don't know anymore about it than you do!" An honest lecturer!

HE SAID, "THEY TRY TO PROVE THE AGE OF THOSE ROCKS BY THE FOSSILS IN THE ROCKS, because the evolutionist says that the fossils are that old. Therefore the geologist knows that the rock is that old. And you know how the evolutionists know the fossil is that old? Because the geologist said the rock is that old!" Two liars proving each other! It's crazy! You talk about fairy tales, even mythology is more believable than evolution! At least they've got some plan and some plot to the myths and the legends. There's no rhyme nor reason to evolution, nothing at all!

NOW, FIRST OF ALL, ROMANS 1:20 ENDS WITH THE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT THAT MAN IS WITHOUT EXCUSE. God's own handiwork, the material Creation, is the proof of the existence of the immaterial God. The visible Creation proves the existence of the invisible God, so He says they're without excuse. Why?

IN OTHER WORDS, THESE PEOPLE WHO CLAIM NOT TO BELIEVE IN GOD, smart scientists and teachers and evolutionists and all the rest of them, I can prove from the Bible that they are liars, they do believe in God.--Unless they are insane idiots, morons, really absolute fools like a demented or retarded child, and maybe some of them are! Because what does the Bible say?

WHO ARE THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY SAY IN THEIR HEARTS THERE'S NO GOD? "The fool hath said in his heart there is no God." (Ps.14:1.) These guys say it with their mouths all the time, but they're like Ralph Underwood who was the head of the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism, the Four A's, one of the most active and bitter atheistic outfits in the U.S. before the communists came along. Afterward he got marvellously saved.

HE USED TO LECTURE and WRITE AGAINST GOD ALL THE TIME. He said, "Dave, all the time I knew there was a God but I hated Him! Therefore I didn't want anybody to believe in Him, therefore I fought Him!" They know there's a God! No man in his right mind can look at one tree and not know there's a God, or study one insect, little tiny speck of life that you can see with your naked eye! Life! An ant!

"GO TO THE ANT, THOU SLUGGARD," one little tiny bug! Man can't even create one little bug.

OH, IT'S SO RIDICULOUS FOR MAN NOT TO BELIEVE IN GOD! Well, it's even more ridiculous to say he doesn't believe in God, when he can't help but believe in God just by looking at Creation! If you're not an absolute fool, if you have a reasoning mind at all, all you have to do is just look at the Creation to know somebody had to put it together and design it and pattern it and make it work like that.

EVEN THE ECOLOGISTS NOW ARE ALMOST GETTING PEOPLE BACK TO FAITH IN GOD because they're showing the balance of nature and how if you destroy one thing, that if you somehow or another upset the thing, the whole thing can get upset because it's so perfectly designed and so delicately balanced, Man and his destruction is wrecking the creation.

SO HE SAID "THEY'RE WITHOUT EXCUSE, NEITHER WERE THANKFUL." That's one of the worst things about it, they're not thankful. They see His Creation, they know He exists, therefore, but they're not even thankful for the Creation, much less for Him. "But became vain in their imaginations." If that isn't a description of evolution, I never heard one! "Vain in their imaginations!" It's all a fairy tale, imagination, pure fiction! Ridiculous fiction. Vain imaginations. (Ro.1:21)

"AND THEIR FOOLISH HEART WAS DARKENED." They rejected the light so of course they have darkness. "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools." Doesn't that sound like our professors of today, our so-called scientists of geology and paleontology? (Ro.1:22)

TALK ABOUT ONE OF THE FAKIEST PHONIEST SCIENCES IN THE WORLD TODAY, IT'S PALAEONTOLOGY, the study of the various ages of the Earth and the fossils and the geology and how old the rocks are and how old the fossils are and the Ice Age, and the Bronze Age and the Iron Age, and blah blah blah blah, all that tommyrot! Pure lies, every bit of it, yet they have whole courses in school on paleontology, just one branch of lies!

THERE ARE COURSES AFTER COURSES IN MODERN UNIVERSITY TODAY THAT ARE ALL LIES, total phoney lies, not a word of truth to the whole thing! Pure vain imaginations, somebody's dreams--nightmares! Pure concoction of some man, not a word of truth in it, and yet they have whole courses in college and university on it, think of that!

"PROFESSING THEMSELVES TO BE WISE THEY BECAME FOOLISH IN THEIR VAIN IMAGINATIONS" and what else? "And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts." (Ro.1:23)

CHANGED THE GLORY OF OUR UNCORRUPTIBLE GOD INTO AN IMAGE! You say, "But man doesn't worship images today, only primitive man, only the backwoodsy superstitious savages worship images today!" Well, you might get a few people to agree with you even that man worships television and he worships his car and house and things like that, but I can show you how the whole educational system is built on worshipping images, particularly evolution.

"INTO AN IMAGE MADE LIKE TO CORRUPTIBLE MAN and TO BIRDS and FOURFOOTED BEASTS and CREEPING THINGS"! That's what the evolutionists worship!--Man, birds, beasts, fourfooted things. "Behold, these are your gods, O ye people, these are the gods that have made you, this little cell, this little tail, this little tadpole, this little lizard, this snake, this serpent, this reptile, he's your forefather, not God! This monkey, he's your forefather!" That's what the evolutionists worship!--Animals!

SOME OF THESE LEARNED SCIENTISTS WOULD BE INSULTED IF YOU CALLED THEM AN ANIMIST, but every evolutionist is an animist, he worships things, fossils and bones and rocks and tadpoles and the creation, the materialistic creation. He says that it created itself, it designs itself, it even changes itself, it adapts itself, all this junk you learn in evolution, mostly in biology, is animism!

IT USED TO BE BIOLOGY WAS A BEAUTIFUL STUDY OF THE MARVELS OF GOD'S CREATION, of flowers and plants and animal life. Do you know what biology has become today?--Nothing but a course in pure naked evolution! That's all! The whole course is to try to prove evolution, the whole thing. The worship and serve the creature, or the creation, more than the Creator.

What has God against unbelieving man? What makes Him so angry and so furious with unbelieving man? Hmm? From all that we've said and all we've read, why is God angry with the unbeliever? It tells you! Because what, first of all? It's obvious that He exists because of His creation, but man refuses to be thankful even for the creation, much less for God, and he insists on worshipping the creation instead of the Creator.

EVERYBODY WHO IS NOT A TRUE BELIEVER IN THE TRUE SPIRITUAL GOD IS AN ANIMIST!--In the broadest sense of the word, and I'm broadening it a lot more than you'll find in the dictionary, I'm giving you my interpretation and I'm convinced it's so. How can you prove it by the Bible?--By that passage you just read. He worships the creation, things, instead of the Spirit, right?

ONE OF GOD'S GREATEST INTERESTS IS IN GETTING YOU TO BELIEVE IN THE UNSEEABLE, getting you to believe in the unseen. "For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are unseen are eternal." (2Co.4:18.)

IF IT IS GOD'S BUSINESS TO TRY TO GET YOU TO BELIEVE IN HIM, THE UNSEEN, WHAT IS THE DEVIL'S BUSINESS? What does God say in this passage that He hates?--that they worship the creation or the things instead of the Creator. So one of the Devil's main lines of business is to keep you from worshipping God and believing in the unseen God, the spiritual God, to get you to worship the things that you can see, the creation, the creature, the material universe.

MODERN MAN WORSHIPS ALL THESE THINGS, he's just as much a worshipper of objects and things and creations as the most superstitious so-called savage in the deepest darkest jungle. But of course he wouldn't be complimented if you said so, but it's true.

ALL THIS YOGISM, TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION, GIVE IT ALL THE NAMES YOU WANT TO, IT'S A VERY CLEVER COUNTERFEIT. It's a subterfuge, it's a phoney false front. They really start you off thinking that you're worshipping yourself and your own mind, the real you. It's all the rage, by the way, in the States today, the worship of you, your mental powers, your mind, your spirit--self-realisation, isn't that one of their terms? "You don't really realise the power that you have!"

WELL, THAT'S TRUE, MOST PEOPLE DON'T REALISE WHAT SPIRITUAL POWER THERE IS EVEN WITHIN THEMSELVES exercised in the Spirit World. But what they don't know that they're getting into is when they start realising this self-power, in the yoga exercises and the yoga positions and the yoga expressions, if any of you have ever studied it, it is horrible, demonic!

IT STARTS OFF REAL GOOD, VERY GOOD POSITIONS and EXERCISES THAT ARE GOOD FOR YOUR BODY. What a clever attack of the Devil, huh? It starts off in the physical, but you wind up inviting the Enemy in to take over! To hold certain positions for hours, even to the point of suspending your breathing, to the point of letting spiritual power, demonic power enter in and take over. That's what nearly all of the Oriental religions are! They are demonic! Self-realisation.

TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION, WHAT DOES THIS WORD MEAN? What is to transcend? To go across from where to where through meditation? Well, literally what it means is to cross over in your mind from the physical World--they may not say it and they may not even warn you of that in such simple terminology--but through meditation and through all these exercises to cause your mind to be able to pass over the portal into the spiritual World.--Where, Beloved, if you're not a child of God protected by the Lord, you will be at the mercy of demon powers, and they don't have much mercy! Demon-possessed!

IT'S NOT THE POWER OF URI GELLER'S MIND WHICH BENDS SPOONS and SILVER! It may seem silly and foolish to you, but the Lord showed me it's child's play in the Spirit World. Did you know there are children in the Spirit World?--And apparently some of them have nothing better to do than going around bending Uri Geller's spoons and forks and stopping the hands on the clock. Nothing instructive about that, in fact, it's very destructive!

MOST OF THESE SELF-REALISATION TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION and YOGA and ALL, they start out telling you, "Well, it's your power, it's your mental power, it's your mind, the power of your spirit, and we're going to get you to be able to exercise your whole power of the self that's within you, the spirit within you"--and eventually they want so much power that they get it! It literally amounts to what Pentecostals call in the Christian spiritual world, "tarrying for the Spirit." Tarrying, praying, waiting to be filled with the Spirit of God, and they'll pray for hours and tarry to be possessed of the Holy Spirit.

THE HARE KRISHNAS SAY THIS NAME OVER and OVER and OVER AGAIN, constantly the name of this god. I know he's not our God, he's not my God, so it must be the name of some demon spirit, some evil spirit king who wants to be worshipped as god! If you worship him enough and say his name over enough and chant it enough and get in the spirit enough, yes, you'll get him! That demon will possess you and you'll be able to have supernatural miraculous powers to levitate, move things on a table, whatever!

PEOPLE CAN GET TO THE POINT WHERE THEY WANT SUPERNATURAL POWER, where they love themselves and worship the creature so much they want that creature to have more power than it's got and they are willing to submit themselves to a higher power, a spiritual power which will give them supernatural powers to move things on a table, bend spoons, stop clocks, levitate, all kinds of things, self-worship, worship of man.

EVEN THE CATHOLICS GET INTO THIS--images that cry and pictures that bleed. You say, "Well, they're worshipping Christ, didn't God do that?" Does this really inspire the worship of Christ and of God, or that particular image, that idol or that picture? Beloved, to me it is a deception and a form of animism and cast images, or a form of idolatry.

NOW THE MODERN ENLIGHTENED CATHOLIC IN AMERICA WILL TELL YOU HE DOES NOT WORSHIP THE IMAGE and he does not worship Mary, it's only an adoration, isn't that the word used? Aren't you taught that you don't worship the image, you don't worship the crucifix, you don't worship the picture, you merely admire it or respect it or adore it like you would your mother or your father?

SOME CATHOLIC CHURCHES OR CHAPELS GO WILD, or some Catholic peasant or peon or little girl or someone sees some kind of a picture cry or the hands bleed or the brow sweats or something, whatever it is, and I mean the people would flock there by the thousands to make it a new shrine! "This is the Madonna which wept! This is the Madonna that said something! This is the Madonna that did something!"

NOW MAYBE WE'RE GETTING TO THE SECRET OF ANIMISM. If the Devil wants you to worship an inanimate object that does not move nor have life, what would he be most apt to try to do to make you believe in it, that it does have power?--To have it move or do something, to animate an inanimate object, to give life to something which does not have life! Can he do it? How?

WHAT WOULD HE DO TO TRY TO MAKE YOU BELIEVE IN THAT STATUE or that picture or that rock or that tree? He would try to manifest some form of life or movement. By what power? (Family: Some spiritual power.) Exactly, by spiritual power. Can he do it? There are thousands, probably millions of incidents where he has caused an inanimate object to move or speak or cry or bleed or manifest some power.

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family International

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